House of Gold
by TungstenCat
Summary: An event as cataclysmic as Heaven's Feel cannot help but attract attention, from vampiric mentors to ancestral enemies. To protect her loved ones and atone for her sins, Rin finds herself making a desperate deal with a certain blonde devil. But deals don't always turn out the way we think they will.
1. Chapter 1

**House of Gold**

 **Author's note** \- Apologies in advance; I'm not really fit to write these two, but I've come to the realization that if I want to see a storyline done, I should probably give it the old college try. If you want to see this pairing done justice, there are fics on AO3 that I cannot recommended enough. Onwards...

Chapter 1

 _Dear Miss Tohsaka,_

 _My congratulations on your recent acquittal before before the court of the Magus Association. How fortunate that as prestigious a figure as the Wizard Marshall chose to intervene on your behalf . With that sorry business out of the way, I am writing to inform you that as head of the Noble House of Edelfelt, I wish to discuss a matter of some importance in your capacity as head of the Tohsaka family. As such, please expect the arrival of our representatives on..._

Rin heaved an irritated sigh as she folded up the letter – inevitably written in fine China ink on pompous embossed stationary, marked with the personal seal of Luviagelita Edelfelt herself – and tucked it back into her sleeve. She supposed that she should have expected that her ancestral enemies would demand a meeting rather than request it, even in the face of her status as Second Owner of Fuyuki. But she found that she was grateful for the anger. She had relied upon such anger as a defense mechanism often in her life, and even now it was a welcome barrier against the anxiety that was steadily coiling itself in her gut.

It was unfair, really. She had received the letter only three days after she returned from London, still shaking from her narrow escape from the collective wrath of the Magus' Association. She knew they would be unhappy with the end of the Fifth Holy Grail War, and their inability to wrest anything from it, but she had not expected the depth of their hostility. Or their determination to wring out anything they could from her, or failing that, destroy her for their own ruthless satisfaction. And even that paled next to her intermittent flashbacks to the War and all its attendant nightmares –

No, no time for that. A Tohsaka must be elegant and dignified at all times, and especially when facing down her rivals. Her father had taught her that .. she winced against the flood of emotions that she associated with him. A great man, a wise man that had patiently helped her unlock the secrets of magic, that opened the door to endless possibilities, that had raised her proud and strong against the world... _that had unconcernedly thrown her sister into a living hell, that had placed all his trust in a man as obviously unbalanced as Kirei, whose failures in the Fourth War had resulted in untold death and suffering_ – with an effort, she quelled the tangled ball of feelings and forced herself back into some semblance of calm. She could deal with all that later. Her "guests" were due to arrive at any moment.

Almost as if on cue, Rin felt the slight but unpleasant tingle that was characteristic of another magus crossing the manor's boundary field. She would wait for the knock on the front door before getting up from her seat to answer it. She was an important and busy magus, and she certainly had more important things to do than hover around her door with baited breath and anxious heart for her visitors to arrive. At least, that was the impression she hoped to convey – nevermind the small furrows she had dug into the parlour carpet pacing back and forth all morning. Once she judged the delay sufficient, she gathered her courage with a deep breath, crossed the small distance to the foyer and smartly pulled the door open.

The young blonde woman on her doorstep beamed at her, a brilliant smile that seamlessly combined the charm and arrogance of a natural aristocrat. Impossibly thick strands of sun-blonde hair, arranged into long drills that should have looked outrageous but instead perfectly framed that lithe, elegant body. Her eyes were a rich brown, melting into amber rays that caught the noonday light just-so. Only years of careful practice controlling her facial expressions as the idol of Homuhara High School allowed Rin to keep some semblance of decorum. She'd previously obtained pictures of the other family head of course, but it was one thing to acknowledge beauty in a detached sort of way while clinically analyzing a foe's headshots, quite another thing to encounter the living, breathing version only a foot away. She let her eyes wander a bit further, and noted the man dressed in well-fitted black behind her. His face was lined with years of hard living and his hair was greying at the temples, but his eyes swept her with the penetrating gaze of a seasoned veteran. Inwardly, Rin was impressed with the message being sent by Edelfelt. A single bodyguard, but one of obvious competence – enough to demonstrate respect when entering a potentially hostile magus' territory, but not so many as to signal an obvious threat.

Rin forcibly reminded herself that these were her guests, at least superficially. She attached the requisite courteous smile and moved to wave them inside. "Miss Edelfelt," she nodded, "and company. I trust you had a pleasant journey?"

The blonde's smile somehow widened even further. "Miss Tohsaka. As pleasant as could be expected, thank you. Charter planes are rather comfortable, but unfortunately the landing is a bit further away. If I could impose on you to allow Aleksi," she waved towards the man in black, "and myself to rest our weary feet."

"Of course, please do come in."

Five minutes later, all three were seated in comfortable chairs around a round table in the Tohsaka Manor's lower drawing room. A thin drift of steam rose from the teapot on the serving tray that Rin had previously set out, carrying with it the faint cinnamon and smoke aroma of her finest black tea. She took a careful sip from her cup and took the opportunity to, hah, drink in the blonde sitting across from her.

The Edelfelts had earned many unflattering epithets from the families they had robbed or threatened over the years, enough that they had reached even Rin's ears here in distant Japan. "Cold hearted pirates." "Blood-soaked and dead-eyed puppets". And, perhaps most commonly, "the world's most elegant hyenas." Well, she could grudgingly admit the elegance. Luvia Edelfelt carried herself with natural grace, and her manners were impeccable as they exchanged the appropriate pleasantries.

But the predator was all too visible as well. Rin didn't miss how the blonde subtly let her eyes roam around the room, silently appraising the decor and furnishings. No doubt, the Tohsaka heir thought with a flash of irritation, it wasn't up to the standards of the excessively rich and snotty. But there was little to be done about it. Much as she might have wished otherwise, she simply didn't have the money to waste trying to impress her family's bitterest rivals.

She'd even had to back off from a notion of asking Shirou to serve as a temporary butler for the night. First, because she didn't want to take him away from her sister, however briefly; he and Sakura deserved and needed to be with each other after all they'd been through. But also, the cold voice of her inner magus whispered, because no good could come of letting the Edelfelts see him. As refined as their emissaries might seem, their sinister reputation preceded them. Even if they failed to recognize Shirou as a magus, they might target him simply due to a perceived association with her. And after all her mistakes in the War, and her bitter regrets, she refused to put the two people she loved most into the path of danger.

She was abruptly roused from her thoughts when Edelfelt slid her untouched cup to one side. The delicate way that the blonde folded her hands together on the table belied the sudden steel in her eyes. "That's all well and good, but I am here to talk business. Your family owes the House of Edelfelt a significant debt. It is high time that we collected it."

 _Ah, playtime is finally over and out come the daggers. Good, the small talk was becoming unbearable._ Rin gave her a sardonic grin as she gently set down her own saucer. "Really now. I assure you that the Tohsakas have no outstanding debts, financial or otherwise. Simply not liking us doesn't entitle you to compensation."

To Rin's surprise, Edelfelt leaned back and laughed, her eyes sparkling merrily. "Ohohoho! I realize that a lesser family can't be expected to keep proper accounting, but even you must be aware of the Third Holy Grail War?"

 _Of course._ It always came back to the Wars somehow, didn't it? Damn all three families and the other bastards that had created and maintained this accursed ritual. How much more blood and tears was it going to cost her, cost her family? She rubbed her temple and forced herself to focus.

"I know that members of both our families competed in that conflict, yes. But that hardly counts. Participation is voluntary, and the risk of death well-known. Your champions could have surrendered their rights to the overseer and bowed out. They chose to fight and suffered the consequences." She tilted her chin defiantly. "You'll have to do better than that."

Edelfelt did not seem the least bit phased. If anything, she had the nerve to look a little amused. "Not the conflict itself. We've participated in enough over the years that it would be graceless to fault you for hostilities during the course of the War itself." Then she frowned, and her previously relaxed demeanour stiffened into something approaching ice. "We can however fully fault your ancestor for what happened afterward. The theft of a Magic Crest is an unforgivable crime."

It was just as well Rin had already put down her tea cup, or she would have shattered it in her rage. "They were in love! The Crest went fair and square to her descendants. No deceits, no coercion." She unconsciously touched her left arm defensively.

"Let's assume that's true for the time being. Even if it was, it doesn't change anything." Had Rin ever thought that the blonde's eyes had been a warm amber? They were chips of stone, cold and hard as they rested on her. "A Magic Crest does not belong solely to its possessor, but to the whole clan. Even a peasant like yourself must know this. Whatever her motivations might have been, it was not hers to give. Thus the union, and the passing down of the Crest to you, is most assuredly theft."

"I'm not giving it up."

"No self-respecting magus would. Even if you did, it wouldn't erase the insult. An offense of this magnitude must be paid in blood."

It figured; everything that magi touched inevitably turned to violence. _To be a magus is to walk hand-in-hand with death_. How many times had she repeated her father's words to herself in the last few weeks? To think this was the life that Matou Shinji had been so envious of, so desperate for that he was willing to forfeit his very soul for the chance. She felt sick. "A Magus Duel, then?"

"That might work if this were a personal slight. Something between the two of us. But this involves whole bloodlines. Even if you were to defeat me, my family would hardly consider the matter settled."

"I see. Something's happened in London, and you need a show of strength." Rin picked up her cup again and took an aggressive sip of tea. She flicked her eyes between the blonde before her and the grim man on her left. "You are bound and determined to make an example of me. I suppose I should thank you for taking the time to deliver your declaration of war in person." Would they attack her on the spot? Unlikely; it would be the height of poor form. Even mercenaries like the Edelfelts understood the need to maintain certain rules of engagement, if only for their own benefit. Still, one could never discount the possibility of a magus taking advantage of an opportunity, however shameless.

"Don't be so hasty," chided Edelfelt with the hint of a smirk. "I've come to offer you a proposition."

"Proposition? What do you mean?"

"If the Tohsaka family had stolen the Magic Crest of the Edelfelts, that would of course merit serious retribution. Of course, if the marriage had been agreed to by both clans, then naturally there is no question of theft."

"Naturally, but that's not what happened."

"Are we so sure? The end of the Third Holy Grail War is shrouded in mystery. There are few remaining records of that time. It's not impossible that such an agreement was reached."

A polite but convenient fiction, designed to save face. But if the Edelfelts would be satisfied with just that, surely the bargain would have been offered a long time ago. The other shoe had yet to drop, and it was likely to be a war boot lined with spikes. Best to cut to the chase immediately. "What's the catch?"

"Both clans would have needed to bring value to the union. Of course, there's nothing the Tohsaka could have offered that would have been worth a bearer of the glorious Edelfelt Crest marrying into their family. But if it had gone the other way, with the Tohsaka becoming a branch of the Edelfelts..."

"No."

"Have you considered -"

"No. I'd rather die. You're asking me not only to make a mockery of my great-grandparents' love, but dishonour all my ancestors. All their achievements." Fear gripped her insides like a vise, but a heady swell of indignation was keeping its effects at bay. Not to mention making her tongue reckless. "As you said yourself, a magus represents not only herself, but her family. So we'll fight, and no doubt you'll win, because you have numbers and resources and experience as trained killers. But I can make it cost you. And I can leave this world with my head held high and my pride intact." What was left of her pride, after having failed both as a magus and as a sister. Well, at least she could end things on a relatively high note.

To her astonishment, Edelfelt's stony countenance melted into an approving grin. "A brave answer. I'm ready to believe that we share blood after all." She held up a hand, cutting off Rin's indignant retort. "And if this matter concerned only yourself, I would accept that answer and look forward to the battlefield. "But," and her smile turned sly, "you aren't quite the last Tohsaka, are you?"

She snapped her fingers and her companion produced a black leather-bound dossier, which he then slid across the table. Rin hesitated, then gingerly picked it up with all the caution due a poisonous snake. _Please, please, let this not be what I think it is..._

Forcing herself to maintain the appearance of calm in spite of her heartbeat thundering in her ears, she opened the dossier. Of course, there were the expected photographs, meticulously laid out and labeled with dates and locations. She made an attempt at clinical detachment as she slowly leafed through them, but her stomach lurched uncomfortably as she was confronted with her sister's smiling face.

Sakura sitting in the courtyard of the Emiya home, surrounded by recently hung laundry and stretching herself out in the sunshine in a rare, unguarded moment. Rin flipped the page. Sakura, chatting amiably with Ayako as they assembled equipment for the archery club. Another one of her walking home with Shirou, a faint blush just visible on both their faces.

There was a faint cough from the other side of the table, and she realized she'd been staring too long. She raised her eyes to meet Edelfelt's, and was surprised to see a hint of apology before it gave way to a triumphant smirk. Not good, but maybe this situation could still be salvaged. She had to try. Rin waved vaguely at the dossier and shrugged. "I fail to see what Matou Sakura has to do with this. For someone so obsessed with bloodlines, you seem surprisingly confused about the local ones."

"On the contrary. That your father adopted her out to the Makiris doesn't change that she is the descendant of the Tohsakas, and thus a beneficiary of their alleged theft."

Almost against her will, Rin found herself turning the pages of the dossier. Another shot, this time of all the War's survivors seated on the Emiya house's engawa. Sakura happily leaning up against Shirou, whispering something in his ear that made the boy flush lightly. Rin herself, sipping her tea and staring off somewhere into the distance. Rider, her blindfold still in place – even with her best efforts, it would still be a while before the specially-ordered glasses arrived. To have taken such an intimate photograph in spite of the Boundary fields, and Rider's finely-toned senses... how easily could the camera have been replaced with a sniper rifle? She felt her blood run cold.

"Besides," continued Edelfelt gently, as if trying not to further upset a wounded animal, "She and the boy are both survivors of the Grail War, which can only draw attention regardless of bloodline. Especially since she seems able to maintain a top-class familiar," she tapped the image of Rider with one impossibly perfect nail.

Rin's mind raced as she stared down at the image. Between them, could they mount an effective resistance to the Edelfelt and their retainers? Rider was a cunning and deadly heroic spirit, especially with Sakura providing all the mana she could ever need. Nor should Emiya himself be underestimated; despite his amiable and soft-spoken nature, he had more than proved his mettle again and again in the War, and he would be even fiercer if Sakura's welfare was on the line. Nor was Rin herself to be underestimated in matters of magecraft. But the enemy was not to be underestimated, either. From everything she had heard, the Edelfelts had well earned their reputation as competent and ruthless mercenaries, and no doubt that some unpleasant surprises in reserve.

As she considered, Edelfelt looked up and snapped her fingers, as if just now remembering something. "Of course, we're not the only ones interested. The end of this War caused quite an uproar, after all, even before your trial and the Wizard Marshall's return. Two survivors of such a conflict, especially with Miss Matou's... unique circumstances, have naturally brought out the hunters from the woodwork. Not all of them gentle."

Rin looked at her sharply. "If you so much as touch her, or I find out you sicced anyone on her -"

"And here I thought she was of no consequence to you? Tsk, you must learn to keep a better poker face. Don't frown like that. Despite what you might think, I have better manners then to start in with threats against your loved ones." Rin glared suspiciously as the blonde smoothed out one of her ringlets, apparently deep in thought. "I was thinking that I _might_ be inclined to help protect them, actually, if they were important to one of my family members. It's too onerous a task to be done out of charity for a stranger, but family protects their own, you know?"

 _Damn her_. The meaning couldn't be clearer. Agree to this... this devil's bargain... and her sister would be safe. Refuse, and the Edelfelts would make sure that her loved ones would suffer for it, and suffer hard.

Rin opened and closed her fists, resisting the urge to grab the blonde's head and slam it repeatedly against the table. Surrendering the Tohsaka as a branch of the Edelfelt clan wasn't just a matter of pride and honour, as integral as those were to her sense of identity. It would also mean submitting to their authority on all matters, from her role as steward of Fuyuki, to her education and training, and probably even down to her fashion choices, with how controlling the older families could be. It would especially, she thought with a painful swallow, dictate who and when she would marry. What would become of her children.

Her fingers itched to grab one of her gems and show the other magus exactly what she thought of this proposal. To send Edelfelt limping back to Europe, and make preparations for battle. Perhaps, with the help of her sister and their friends and whatever allies her family name could still pull, they might even win.

But then Rin pictured herself sitting across from Sakura and having to explain that her current peace, so recently acquired after a lifetime of torment, was being shattered. That they would all be returning to the battlefield, to more fire and blood and tears. And more victims, when Sakura still bore guilt over the lives lost to the Shadow. The last time Rin had stayed the night, she had heard her sister screaming and sobbing in the early hours of the morning. She dreaded to think how often Shirou had to soothe her back to sleep. And she would be the one to plunge her back into a nightmare of violence. All in the name of the Tohsaka pride. The same pride that had caused their father to hurl Sakura into hell. Could she now, after all they had been through, turn around and do the same?

Rin's mouth felt like it was full of ash. But what choice did she have? She looked down again at Sakura's smiling face next to Shirou, and felt her resolve harden. She raised her head and looked Edelfelt straight in the eye as she forced through gritted teeth, "Very well. I accept your proposal."

The blonde gave her a genuine smile; after all, she could afford to be gracious in victory. "Welcome home, cousin."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

"Thanks again for keeping an eye out on Fuyuki while I'm gone, Shirou. It's a big relief knowing that you and Rider have a handle on things here while I'm abroad."

"It's no trouble at all, Tohsaka. If anything, it's good to know that anything I need to do comes with the Second Owner's seal of approval."

"Hey now -"

"A Hero of Justice must take swift action," said Rider evenly, "on occasion even of the dramatic and eye-catching kind."

"Don't say that so lightly! I've just gotten raked over the coals by the Magus Association for "breaches in secrecy", I'm not eager to go through it all again." Rin glared at the Servant, looking in vain for even a ghost of the smirk she felt sure was hidden in the woman's carefully blank expression. To her left, Sakura raised a hand to her mouth, probably to hide her smile.

The rays of the afternoon sun filtered lazily through the windows of the Emiya household's dining room, where all four survivors of the Fifth Holy Grail War were currently seated around the table admiring Sakura's latest experiment with Western-style baking. Rin wasn't that familiar with European desserts, but even she could see the effort that had gone into what her sister proudly informed her was a _linzertorte_. The pastry's crust was a glorious golden-brown, with a layer of redcurrant jam covered by the delicate lattice of dough strips that characterized the dish. The light, fruity smell was balanced by the heavier, earthy aroma of black coffee wafting from a pot.

An avowed tea-drinker, Rin sniffed the coffee in her cup suspiciously before taking a small sip. Not bad, if not precisely to her taste, and somehow appropriate. The underlying bitterness of the liquid reflected the nasty twist in her gut whenever she thought of that disastrous bargain she'd been forced into with Edelfelt. No, now wasn't the time to focus on that; she would worry about it later. Right now she wanted to enjoy what might be the last unencumbered time she could spend with her loved ones.

"But I'm surprised you're leaving for London so soon, Tohsaka," Shirou's cheerful voice dragged her from her thoughts, "I thought you still had a little while before you had to report in to the Clocktower."

"Well, something unexpected came up so I need to head to Europe a little earlier." Finland rather than London, but they didn't need to know that. Edelfelt had had the arrogance to present her with a pre-booked ticket to Turku before taking her leave the other day. As if Rin's surrender had been a foregone conclusion, a mere formality in whatever blackhearted scheme the blonde was planning -

"Neesan, are you alright? You're, uh, gripping that cup rather hard."

"Just thinking about an acquaintance of mine." She forced herself to relax, using a fork to dig into her satisfyingly crumbly slice of _torte_. "But while I'm there, did you want me to keep up a travelogue? After all, you two are going to have to start planning your honeymoon sooner or later." She grinned impishly as the two younger teenagers blushed furiously. As Shirou began babbling nervously about finishing studies, she allowed herself a small sigh of relief. She felt much more in her element teasing them than worrying about her own future.

"Well, don't you lovebirds leave it for too long. The sooner Sakura becomes an Emiya, the better." She had intended a joking tone, but that last sentiment had come out much firmer than she had intended. But lost in thought, Rin failed to notice the strange looks being directed her way. "Also," she mused, more to herself than anyone else, "If anyone asks if you're related to the Tohsaka family, you should probably deny it."

Realization set in when she saw Sakura's face crumple, her eyes threatening to spill with tears, before her sister quickly covered it up with that practiced smile of hers, the one that was just a little too brittle around the brow. "I... I understand. I'm tainted by Matou magic; it's natural that Neesan wouldn't want to be associated with me -"

Rin flew up from her seat and threw her arms around her sister, wrapping her in a tight embrace. "Oh Sakura, I'm so sorry. I didn't stop to think how that would sound. You have absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. I'm so proud of you, I want to shout it from the rooftops that you're my sister." Sakura hiccuped and burrowed her face into her shoulder, but at least she seemed to be calming down a little. Distantly she noted that Shirou's furrowed brow had given way to a relieved smile, while the subtle tension in Rider's frame subsided. Rin continued patting her sister's hair soothingly as she murmured, "I'm sorry, I'm so clumsy about these things. If anything, you're the one better off not being associated with me. Safer."

Sakura lifted her head to look her in the eyes. "Are you in some sort of trouble, Neesan?"

"Just Clocktower politics, nothing I can't handle. Worry about the sports festival instead, you know Mitsuzuri is counting on you to help with the demonstrations."

Her sister frowned, then gently took Rin's hands in hers. "You don't have to do everything by yourself anymore, you know. You can tell us, we're family."

Rin's first instinct was to deflect, to find some way to change the subject. But she'd already made her sister feel unwanted once today, and she was bound to see it as a further rejection. Besides, that earnest face and kind eyes... _ugh, can't say no_. She reluctantly leaned back and sipped her coffee, crinkling her nose at both the taste and the unwanted subject. "Are you familiar with the name Edelfelt?"

"Umm, vaguely. .. it's been a long time. One of the old magus families, right?"

"Yep. They consider themselves the Tohsaka's rivals in jewel magecraft. Also, they've traditionally hated us. A lot. For a whole litany of alleged wrongs."

"Of which you are of course wholly innocent." Rider deadpanned. Rin didn't deign answer that, instead contenting herself with tossing a lock of hair back over her shoulder. "Hmph. Those opportunists would label anything as a personal affront if it meant they could justify extracting a pound of flesh for it."

"So what did you do to make them angry, Tohsaka?"

"Really, now even Emiya-kun thinks the worst of me? How cruel the sting of accusation, and after all the hard work I've put in for all of you."

"Neesan, stop changing the subject."

"Tch, fine. I'll make it brief then." While Rin usually enjoyed an opportunity for a teaching moment – okay, to show off her knowledge, if she were honest with herself – she was still burning with rage and humiliation from the other night. She didn't want to relive it any more than necessary. "As even Emiya-kun knows, Magic Crests are formed from magic circuits to pass magical knowledge and spells from one generation to the next. In many ways, you could say the Crest _is_ the family. It so happens that our great-grandmother was an Edelfelt, who married our great-grandfather without her clan's permission. As far as they are concerned, our inheritance of her Crest is thus a theft."

While Sakura looked suitably grim at this news, Shirou mostly looked confused. "Huh. But you can't detach a Crest once it's implanted, right? So they want you to pay them?"

Rin sighed and rubbed her forehead, cursing Emiya Kiritsugu – not for the first or, probably, last time – for neglecting to teach his son even the basics of magus society. "No, Shirou, it's not just a matter of money or secrets. The price for an insult of that magnitude is death."

"What? But wait, aren't you guys relatives? They wouldn't -" he turned to his girlfriend for support, then quietly closed his mouth when he saw her tense expression. Of course, reflected Rin bitterly, Sakura more than most would know just what a magus was willing to do, even to their closest kin, in the name of magecraft.

She coughed lightly and set her coffee down. "Since the vendetta involves the Tohsaka family, the debt needs to be paid by the Tohsaka family. Whatever else it caused, being a Matou at least puts you out from under that umbrella. Marrying Emiya-kun makes it even clearer, so - "

"We won't leave you to fight them alone, Tohsaka," interrupted Shirou fiercely, reaching for the hand of an equally determined Sakura. "I may not have Archer's arm anymore, but I can still Project his swords, and whatever else we might need."

"Thank you, but -"

"Were you really planning on telling us nothing, so that the enemy caught us by surprise?" Rider's tone was stern and disapproving.

"I'm not finished -"

"I've already lost so much, I'm not going to give up anybody else without a fight. That includes you, Neesan. So don't try to stop -"

"There won't be a fight!" Rin yelled, slamming a palm down on the table. The forks and plates clattered in the sudden silence as she took a deep breath to steady herself. "There won't be a fight. I've already reached an arrangement with the Edelfelt head."

"... you're handing yourself over...?"

"No, no, not to be killed." Although that might have been kinder, she thought to herself. She forced herself to look nonchalant as she continued. "I've agreed to having the Tohsaka clan become a branch family of the Edelfelts."

"Neesan, you didn't...!" Once again, Sakura immediately grasped the situation, and the nature of the sacrifice her sister was making. "But you owe a duty to the family -"

"I don't care!" she said hotly, "You've already given up so much for the Tohsaka name, I'm not going to let it continue. Besides," she grumbled, "I've already given my word, so it's a done deal."

Rin was startled when when Sakura rushed forward to engulf her in a hug so tight it was almost painful. "Thank you, Neesan. I know it's selfish of me, but thank you."

"There's nothing selfish about wanting peace after everything you've been through," she said, biting back tears. The sisters held each other for a few moments, feeling a lifetime of estrangement and hard feelings ebb away further, before they separated and resumed their seats a little awkwardly.

Shirou squeezed Sakura's hand reassuringly, then looked across at Rin. "So this is the unexpected thing that's making you leave early?"

"Unfortunately, yes. They're making me swear my new loyalties in a ceremony at the Edelfelt ancestral home. Officially, it's a formal way of welcoming us to the family, and making introductions between relations. Practically, it's a way of pinning me down in front of witnesses so there's no way I can weasel out of the agreement afterwards. You can be sure that Edelfelt's invited a whole cast from the Magus Association and the Church and god knows who else to watch her new performing monkey." Her eyes flashed with irritation. "Scripted vows, of course. At least she didn't send me a dress code; I wouldn't have put it beyond that harridan."

As Rin warmed up to her rant, her family and friends exchanged looks of fond amusement. For all her years perfecting the image of the composed and aloof school idol, she never could tolerate rivals with much grace.

"- it's in Finnish, of course. Wouldn't she find it just so amusing to hear me stumble through it like a kindergartner in front of everyone? Hah, she won't get that satisfaction. A magus must be proficient in languages, after all. If I could master German and Latin, I can master Finnish too."

"But isn't Finnish supposed to be one of the hardest languages to learn for a non-native?" observed Rider.

"I don't care. If I have to spend the rest of my life under the Edelfelt's boot, I at least want to know what they're saying. Anyway, if that blonde sow could learn Japanese, I can definitely learn Finnish."

"Well, it's nice to see Tohsaka hasn't lost her competitive edge," said Shirou amiably. Rin glared at him, then over at Sakura, who wasn't even attempting to hide her soft laughter.

"Hmph. Edelfelt might think she's clipped my wings, but there are other ways to fight beyond the direct approach. You just wait and see."

* * *

Halfway across the world, Luvia Edelfelt looked at the stack of reports neatly piled on her desk and heaved a sigh. She had just finished breakfast, and already several additional missives had arrived from the family retainers, each requiring her attention and approval. It was easily one of her least favourite tasks that she had inherited from her father after he had abdicated his position as head of the family.

Although her parents' marriage had been arranged in the best magus tradition, there was no doubt that her father had been passionately devoted to her. So much that her early death had hit the man hard, and he had never fully recovered. He drifted through life, both as head of the clan and her remaining parent, fulfilling his obligations in a distant and distracted sort of way. Perhaps it had been inevitable that when his rusted heart finally opened up to another, he would go completely overboard and elope with her. What _was_ it with her kin and their terrible judgment in matters of the heart?

Luvia had rather liked Venla, her father's new chauffeur and personal assistant, when she had joined the household following her predecessor's retirement. She was cheerful and resilient even in the face of the Edelfelt house's endless unspoken rules and expectations. At first she had even appreciated how her gentle ribbing and informal speech gradually drew her father out of his shell. The rest of the family had not been so accepting of their budding romance.

There had been a lot of hard words, and even harder actions. The result was that her father had abandoned his responsibilities in favour of disappearing somewhere in northern Asia with his new wife, while Luvia grappled with her sudden promotion as the new head and a most unwelcome pang in her heart. That didn't stop her from opening his occasional letters, decorated with faded postmarks from around the world, even if she never responded to them. She had a responsibility to keep an eye on him after all, to ensure his safety, even if she could never forgive him.

No matter, she thought to herself fiercely; she had been properly born and raised for this role. Let the family discontents grumble about her youth and naivete, she would show them that she had things well in hand. And as the accomplished and dignified head of the great Edelfelt family, _she_ would marry a suitable gentlemen of proper lineage and upbringing. Even if that wasn't to her own preferences.

She pushed down a gnawing sense of discontent, instead reaching for the next document with grace and efficiency. Or at least she had intended to, when she suffered a sudden and violent sneezing fit. Papers flew and tea cups were spilled in a most ungraceful manner.

"Are you all right, Miss Luvia?"

The blonde wiped her face sheepishly with her handkerchief before turning to her maid. "Quite all right, Emmi." She frowned as she began righting the items on the desk. "That's funny, I don't feel like I'm coming down with a cold. Maybe fetch some of the red rooibos blend; I'll need to fortify myself for the next few days in any event."

"Very good, miss."

 **Author's note** : It's just not Fate/Stay Night without at least a bit of food porn.

Luvia, the Edelfelts in general, and the Clocktower are criminally underdeveloped in official Type Moon material, unfortunately necessitating the use of OCs to move things along. I'll try to keep them to a minimum.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Luvia ran a critical eye over the room, taking in the rather spartan furniture and mid-quality-at-best fixtures and draperies. Not too bad considering it was the Norwich Student Dormitory, rather than one of the Edelfelt family's usual mansions, but it couldn't be denied that there was room for improvement practically everywhere. Starting, of course, with security.

"Mikael, I'll need a few items to strengthen up the defenses in this place. About a dozen of the Siam rubies, and of course the black spinels. We'll need to think about the mundane defenses too, perhaps switch out the glass for something a bit more resilient."

Her cousin nodded as he walked around the room, snapping a few photographs for reference. He was a few years older than Luvia herself, and had already matured into the powerful build and thick blonde beard typical of Edelfelt males. Although unable to inherit the family Crest, his good supply of magic circuits had granted him one of their more infamous Mystic Codes, currently hidden in the folds of his long blue coat. It gave him purpose and made him useful in a pinch, but also made him a bit... snippy at times.

"Won't the Clocktower take offense?" Mikael mused as he looked around, satisfied with his work, and slipped his camera back into his pocket. "They have their own magical defenses set up, after all."

"Yes, but student dormitories aren't exactly a priority for our elders. As you can tell from the state of this boundary field," she sniffed. "Besides, this entire floor belongs to us now, so we can go ahead and set up our own fields without worrying about interference from other students."

"Except for Tohsaka." He didn't even try to hide the disapproval in his voice. "You should have followed the elders' recommendations and just killed her."

"The elders recommended termination because they didn't think I could get her to capitulate. This way, we obtained control of a new territory with some decent laylines, some valuable patents, and generations' worth of mystical research. Not to mention the prestige of claiming not just one, but two of the Wizard Marshall's apprentices." She gave him a mischievous smile. "Are you still upset about the pledging ceremony? I thought it went quite smoothly."

"Smoothly?! Aunt Sanni hated her on sight!"

"A point in the girl's favour. May I remind you that Aunt Sanni invariably declares her disapproval of anything new or innovative, including cell phones, automation, and women's suffrage." She had also been one of the most vocal opponents of Luvia receiving both Crest and the position of headship, citing certain "deficiencies of sex and experience" while managing to implicitly add "and character" to the list. It had proved most satisfying to present her latest accomplishment to the family, one to add to a growing list of things she wasn't supposed to be able to do. She still savoured the look of consternation on that withered face -

"- and she managed to spill a whole tray of drinks on Frans! In front of the entire hall!"

Luvia tuned back in as Mikael warmed to his topic, his voice steadily rising with each recounted offense, and smiled wryly."Perhaps he shouldn't have referred to her as the Yellow Peril."

"Admittedly in poor taste, but hardly a justification. It's not as if Tohsaka speaks enough Finnish to have understood." He sighed heavily, running a hand through his cropped blonde hair before fixing Luvia with a baleful stare. "Trying to integrate her into the family is an unnecessary risk. You are inviting a snake's daughter into your home, to dine at your table and sleep by your hearth. One that is furious with you, at that." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a thin cigarette, lighting it up and drawing deeply in defiance of Luvia's frown. "At the very least, won't you consider having her sign a self-geas scroll to bind her fully?"

Luvia sighed in turn. "You've missed the entire point of the exercise. The resources we've gained through this are nice enough, but they are mere trinkets. Rather, we are sending a message that the House of Edelfelt can offer a velvet glove as well as an iron gauntlet; to encourage our enemies to cooperate with us for mutual benefit instead of fighting us to the bitter end. The effect is rather lost if we force our new allies to submit to a geas, don't you think?"

Mikael slowly tapped his cigarette, deliberately dropping ash onto the floor. "I think that this stunt is hardly going to change the Vendramins' minds; obtaining that contract is a pipe dream." He looked her firmly in the eye. "I also think that you're kidding yourself if you think you're being strategic in this. You feel sorry for her, plain and simple. And that foolish sentimentality is going to see us all betrayed and ruined." He stalked away, leaving the acrid scent of smoke behind him.

Luvia waited until the footsteps had disappeared into the distance, then sat heavily on the edge of bed as she collected her thoughts. She wasn't the type inclined to self-doubt, but perhaps she should take a moment to consider her own motives. Viewed objectively, there were good reasons to bring the Tohsaka to heel in a comparatively gentle manner. The Edelfelt family had an not-unearned reputation both for competence, and for walking away with the prime cuts of any conflict they were involved in. While a profitable practice, it did have the disadvantage that some potential clients declined their services for fear of losing more to their erstwhile allies than they stood to gain from victory.

She suspected that this was the cause of the Vendramin clan's continuing refusal to hire the Edelfelts to aid in their ongoing feud with the Durnovo, despite their dire need of the raw firepower that she could offer. Normally that wouldn't be of much concern. There was no shortage of work for mercenaries in the Moonlit World. But she had good reason to want this particular contract. For once, the Edelfelts were not after another family's treasures, but rather a rare opportunity to recover one of their own. As well as a personal opportunity to quiet the naysayers among her kin and further establish her control. Hopefully the Vendramin might recognize her lenient treatment of an ancestral enemy as a signal that she was willing to be reasonable about spoils, and take the bait.

At the same time, she couldn't deny that Mikael had not been entirely wrong about her drive to find an alternate solution to the Tohsaka problem. As she read over the dossier in preparation for negotiations, she had felt a bit of reluctant admiration for the girl. Despite losing both parents early in life and having little in the way of guidance outside of a priestly friend of the family (albeit a former Executor), she had nevertheless survived a Holy Grail War, a conflict well-known for its savagery even among magi. She had all the responsibilities as both family head and overseer thrust on her at an early age. And she was as relentlessly, as cruelly bound to the harsh realities of magus life as Luvia herself. Pouring over the accompanying photographs of a dark-haired girl with the sharpest aquamarine eyes she had ever seen, Luvia couldn't help but think that an execution would just be _such a waste_.

She was interrupted from her thoughts by a abrupt knock on the door. Well, speak of the devil. Luvia stood and smoothed out her blue dress, checking herself once in the mirror to ensure everything was in order, before calling out. "Enter."

After a moment's hesitation, Rin stepped into the room. Her face reflected a sort of ill-tempered resignation as she nodded tersely to Luvia. The blonde took the opportunity to look over her newest charge, and inwardly smiled in approval. As in Turku, she had shed the (admittedly fetching) sweater and miniskirt in favour of a more staid black slacks and a silk blouse. In red, the Tohsaka's traditional colour, but it suited her so well that Luvia was inclined to let it go.

Then the girl had to open her mouth and ruin the moment. "Was it really necessary for you to reserve an entire floor of the dormitory? That seems excessive, even for you." Then, with a renewed burst of irritation, "And with all that space, why on earth did you insist I take the room next to yours?"

"Because I need to keep an eye on you, obviously. Judging from your antics in Turku, you need quite a bit of training before you're fit to be unleashed in public." Rin flushed with anger and embarrassment while Luvia struggled to hold in her laughter. While she'd largely approved of what had transpired at the ceremony, there was no need to let Rin know that. There was something strangely appealing about needling her, taunting the volcano to see how long she could maintain her facade before the inevitable eruption.

But enough fun, she had called her in for a reason after all. "Speaking of public, we need to set some ground rules while you are studying here in London. As you now represent the Edelfelt family, even if to a lesser degree, you will need to comport yourself with appropriate grace and dignity. I'm sure you can manage it despite your rough start." She ignored the murderous look thrown her way and pressed on. "While you will be sociable and agreeable with our peers, as befits good breeding, you are to maintain an appropriate distance. With your appalling ignorance of Association politics and alliances, you risk befriending or offending the wrong party. As such, I must insist that you seek permission before you attempt to forge anything more than superficial friendships."

"Don't worry, I've had a lot of practice keeping people at arms-length," said Rin, although she wasn't quite able to keep the crease from her brow. "I suppose I should have expected that some things never change," she softly muttered to herself.

Luvia continued as if she hadn't heard. "Needless to say, any and all intimate relationships are strictly forbidden to you. We need to cement your allegiance to the family. I'll marry you off to a suitable cousin when the time comes. Until then, no complications." She had expected a squawk of protest or other outburst of temper, but to her surprise, Rin simply gave her a morose nod. "You have no objections?"

"Why should I? Arranged marriages are standard among our kind. Besides," she gave Luvia a tight smile, "It's not like you're asking anything of me that you're not asking of yourself, too."

Of course. Even Tohsaka, raised in the wilds of Japan, would have early on absorbed the truth that most magus unions were loveless affairs, designed not to bring happiness but to optimize bloodlines. It was an unpleasant fact of life that Luvia herself had struggled with in the past – still struggled with, in her moments of weakness. She felt an unexpected pang of sympathy for the girl and, before she even realized it, she had reached out and grabbed Rin's hand. Gave it a comforting squeeze.

If she had surprised herself, she was even more astonished when the other girl closed her eyes and squeezed back. The warm pressure of her palm and delicate fingers felt strange, but not unpleasant. Then realization set in on both sides and each yanked their hand back as if it were on fire. Rin stared at her suspiciously while Luvia tried to resume her aloof manner.

What had possessed her to do that? After their acrimonious recent history, she had no reason to think Rin would welcome her touch, however well-intentioned. _It's just that she looked lonely, and you understand that particular brand of loneliness all too well, don't you?_

Luvia forced the unwelcome thought away and coughed awkwardly. "There's another matter. Although you have been duly accepted into the Department of Mineralogy as the Wizard Marshall's apprentice, there's a problem with your chosen schedule. Specifically, the bit where you're planning to attend Lord El-Melloi II's lectures."

"What? Look, I know that Modern Magecraft Theories isn't exactly prestigious, but I think it's been unfairly overlooked. Some of Lord El-Melloi's work in particular -"

"Denied. He is the worst sort of magus; the sort to be avoided by any self-respecting practitioner of the arts. Drop his lecture and find something worthwhile to do with your time."

"No. I want to hear what he has to say." Rin stared up at Luvia defiantly. "I don't agree with everything he says, but he's right that magi place too much emphasis on bloodlines and legacies." She flinched in the face of Luvia's glare, but stubbornly continued."One of the greatest magus I ever met didn't have a lick of breeding or training; hell, he didn't have know how to activate his magic circuits properly. But he brought about a miracle, something that all the Lords in their power could never have managed. So I want to keep an open mind. I don't want to close off any potential avenues, even if they don't come from an approved source." Then the energy seemed to drain out of her and she dropped her gaze to one side, continuing in a quiet tone. "I won't fight you on the rules about friends or romances. But please let me manage my education. I have things I need to do here at the Clocktower, things I can't forget about."

Luvia grabbed Rin's chin, earning her a muffled gasp, and forcibly lifted her head so that their eyes met. She stared deeply into those startled aquamarine eyes, searching for any hint of subterfuge. She saw only confusion and apprehension; of course, there was the possibility that the girl was simply an excellent liar -

"Luvia?"

"If these projects of yours in any way interfere with your duties to the family, or reflect badly on the Edelfelt name, there will be consequences. Have I made myself clear?"

Rin shivered at the intensity of her stare, but to the girl's credit, she did not look away. "Crystal."

"Good. Then on your own head be it." The blonde let go and took a step back, letting the other take a moment to collect herself.

Rin coughed. "Will that be all?"

Luvia tapped her chin thoughtfully. "There's something else, after all. It's past seven, and I imagine you haven't had dinner yet. Left to your own devices, you'll probably poison yourself with some horrible London pub food. I suppose I have no choice but to show you something at least a little civilized."

"... How the hell do you manage to make even a dinner invitation sound like the trial of Sisyphus?"

"I'll choose to ignore your ingratitude. Shall we be off?"

* * *

Rin was finding it increasingly difficult to figure out how she felt about her new family head (and wasn't that an unfamiliar concept, after a lifetime of aloof independence). The woman had threatened her with the unspeakable, stripped away the core of her identity, and never seemed to pass up an opportunity to piss her off. Rin was pretty sure she hated her, from her excessive (yet gorgeous, damn her) blonde ringlets, to her arrogant smirk, and right down to the soles of her stupidly expensive shoes.

If only she wasn't also so damn _relatable_. The old families invariably impressed upon their children the paramount magus virtues of power and nobility, rather than mere human virtues like compassion or humility. Sometimes, late at night as she was preparing for sleep, Rin found herself wondering how things would have turned out had her father survived the war, had been around to mould her into his vision of a proper heir. Hell, only weeks ago she had been callously declaring that she would kill her own sister in the name of her duty.

Not to mention that for all Luvia's disagreeable temperament, she'd been almost decent in terms of what she was actually forcing on Rin. It could have been much worse, especially since she was pretty much honour-bound to take whatever was dished out. Letting her study under Lord El-Melloi II was a concession, one Luvia was hardly obliged to grant. Maybe it was a treat dangled in front of a newly acquired dog to encourage it to behave? Or had it been a moment of genuine sympathy? Her hand still tingled where they had briefly touched before she remembered to put up her guard.

Whatever else, she couldn't fault the blonde's taste in eateries. Dinner had turned out to be a surprisingly low-key affair at a trattoria on a side street, miles away from the extravagant restaurants that Rin had been dreading. The egg pasta with pomodoro sauce was straightforward but delicious, as was the coffee served afterwards. She could almost have forgotten she was accompanying one of the most feared young heiresses of the Magus Association, if not for Aleksi, the ever-faithful bodyguard, discretely keeping watch from a separate table near the exit.

She'd expected Luvia to rip into her table manners, or something equally obnoxious, but the blonde seemed lost in thought throughout most of the meal. Even now, she had her cup held halfway to her lips, her eyes focused somewhere in the distance. Maybe some light conversation would be helpful, to try and bridge the gap between them; they would be living in close proximity for the foreseeable future after well, might as well try to make it bearable.

Rin hesitated, then coughed a little awkwardly. "This place is nice. It feels a bit down-to-earth for a professed aristocrat like you, though."

"Sometimes simple things are best." Luvia looked almost melancholic as she set down her cup, and Rin felt an unexpected pang of sympathy for her. She had thought something similar once, looking at a certain red-haired boy trying again and again to achieve an impossible jump -

"Besides," the blonde continued, "too sophisticated and you would stick out like a sore thumb."

All sympathy evaporated on the spot as Rin felt her temper boil up again. That would teach her for trying to connect with a raging bitch. At times like this, it was all too easy to remember that Rin loathed her, and likely always would.

She was so busy fuming that she barely registered Luvia settling the check before they headed out into the evening. As they walked along the side streets, she considered how she might revenge herself on her oppressor, silently turning over options in her head. The default, and the one she used to favour back home at Homuhara, would be to simply ignore her affronts in favour of out-achieving her. That was the dignified thing to do, the Tohsaka thing to do. But damned if it wasn't tempting to just smack her right in her stupid face with a well-aimed _Gandr_ -

"Planning something underhanded, are we?" said her would-be target, even as she maintained her stride.

Rin startled, and before she could catch herself muttered, "How did -?"

"Ohohoho, you're predictable to a fault. Every time you go quiet and get that look in your eye, you're thinking about petty vengeance. I had ample opportunity to learn the signs in Turku."

"Your sorry excuses for relatives had it coming," she snapped out. She had intended to maintain an icy demeanour, but as always Luvia seemed to crawl under her skin and bring out the worst of her temper.

"Have a care, Rin. Deserved or not, your retaliatory antics earned you a considerable amount of ill-will."

"You're one to talk about antics, you smug cow." She really shouldn't be antagonizing the person who held so much power over her future, but anger propelled her tongue. "For all your talk of grace and elegance, your constant little insults are just about the height of bad manners."

Luvia looked almost defensive as she raised her chin. "Hmph. I'll have you know I am the picture of proper nobility. It's not my fault you bring out the worst in me."

The unexpected similarity to Rin's own recent thoughts only added fuel to the fire. "Don't you try to pin this on me, you - " She cut herself off mid-sentence as her instincts, finely tuned from the Holy Grail War, whispered to her that something was wrong. The street was suddenly quiet, far too quiet for a Monday night in London even in the comparatively secluded streets on the way back to the Clocktower grounds. There wasn't another person in sight, and even the sounds of traffic and ordinary city life seemed muffled, as if coming from a long distance. The air felt increasingly heavy with an unpleasant static.

Luvia was equally tense as she swept the area with her eyes. "Aleksi's gone. If only I hadn't been distracted - "

The shadows on either side of the street suddenly seemed to both darken and lengthen, looming over both girls as they unconsciously moved closer together in defensive postures. Rin felt a powerful wave of nausea as she watched the shadowy forms coalesce into long tendrils of solidified darkness, dredging up the horrible memory of Sakura's cursed Shadow. But it quickly passed as she realized that they didn't feel the same; while these shadows radiated an icy chill, they felt like a comprehensible application of magecraft. They lacked the horrible crawling feeling of the Shadow, the utter fundamental _wrongness_ that had burned the minds of all who saw it.

The thought gave her courage and she quickly reached into her pocket for a gem as the tendrils writhed threateningly above them. When they abruptly tapered into spear-like points and charged down to impale her, she was ready. She hurled the ruby and detonated it, the flash of flame creating an opening in the dark wall that she promptly dodged through. Not a moment too soon, as she heard cracking concrete behind her as the spears tore through the ground she had just vacated.

As she hastily palmed an orange tourmaline, she noted that the shadows were already reforming, rearing up like a malevolent snake. Another blast of fire kept it at bay while she forced herself to stay calm and think about what she knew about shadow-based magic. As frighteningly fast and flexible as it could be, it lacked in raw punching power. If she could narrow down the enemy's location and force them into a head-on confrontation, it shouldn't be too hard to take them down.

Easier said than done; the tendrils were relentless, stabbing relentlessly forward and tearing up the pavement, sending chunks of asphalt flying, as she avoided them by the skin of her teeth. She heard a roar of wind behind her as she stumbled back, hitting something warm with her shoulder.

"Careful, you plebeian -" Luvia had scarcely begun her tirade when Rin, obeying the danger sense that had repeatedly saved her life in the War, unceremoniously caught her shoulder and yanked her down. An instant later, a black scythe-like appendage hissed through the air above them. While Luvia dispersed it with a burst of hurricane-force wind, both girls scrambled to their feet and ran. The spreading shadows followed doggedly at their heels.

Rin was just wondering how long she could keep this up when Luvia grabbed her arm and steered her towards one of the doorways in the buildings lining the street. The other magus kicked the door open easily (Reinforcement, Rin noted distantly) and dragged her in, throwing the door closed behind her. In unison they climbed a nearby flight of stairs, the hall lighting flickering erratically in their wake.

Rin could feel her heart pounding in her ears as they paused to catch their breath on the third floor landing. "You know that won't stop them, right? And this place is full of shadows, why fuel their magic further?"

"They may be hidden, but they aren't intangible. If they want to pursue us, they'll have to come in as well. And a confined space narrows down where they can strike from." Without warning, Luvia moved forward into Rin's personal space, brushing her ear with her lips. Rin felt herself flush as she stammered, "What do you think you're - !?"

"Hush," the blonde whispered, "If I pin them down, can you take them out?"

Rin swallowed hard and nodded. Satisfied, Luvia reached into her sleeve and produced a very odd-looking gem. The bluish-white striations identified it as larimar, but in an unusual cut that left the edges jagged. Moments later, tendrils of black shadow oozed from the stairwell and spread out to surround them once more. Elemental blasts kept them back for a little while, until suddenly the darkness seemed to perceptibly thicken and the tendrils lashed out with renewed strength.

"Now!" Luvia threw up the odd larimar and shattered it in the air, unleashing a rapidly spreading mist that soon covered most of the stairwell. Within seconds, it crystallized into a latticework of serrated ice crystals that criss-crossed throughout the space.

Delicate as the crystals were, they also tinkled loudly when a black shape vaulted through them from the floor below, trying to pass by to the upper reaches. Fortunately, Rin was prepared.

" _Gandr!"_

The curse flew from her index finger with all the force of a bullet and struck the figure dead on. With a strangled yell, it dropped to the platform with an audible thud and laid there, groaning softly.

Rin moved forward to incapacitate, only to have Luvia put a hand in front of her to hold her back. The Edelfelt heir stepped forward and stood over the prone form. The shadows slowly ebbed away, revealing a as the shadows slowly ebbed away, revealing a pale middle-aged man with thinning black hair. A set of faint scars running over his left eye marred what would otherwise have been a handsome face.

Luvia looked entirely unconcerned as she leaned over him. "Is this to your satisfaction, Jacopo Vendramin?"

The man gave her a tight smile and picked himself up, carelessly brushing dust from his black dress shirt and pants. "Indeed, you and your servant's performance proved quite adequate. We will be in touch." Then with great dignity, as if he had not just fallen a dozen feet to land flat on tile, he nodded their way and headed down the stairs.

Rin immediately sidled up to Luvia. "What's going on here? You know that guy?" she hissed.

The blonde magus patted her hair down to settle it, the very image of serenity. "I'll explain later, when we're in a better location." Her expression turned sharp around the edges. " _Gandr_ ,hmm? Well, at least you've managed some proficiency in the spells you stole."

"You should be glad. That "stolen" spell is what brought down your mysterious friend in one piece."

"True, I can't deny its effectiveness. Very well, let's return for the time being. As exciting as this was, whatever cloud that Vendramin cast will be dissipating. I'd rather avoid any unnecessary awkwardness."

After a bit of discrete work to repair the worst of the damage to the stairwell, they headed out into the street and walked along in silence. After a few minutes, Rin cleared her throat.

"Hey Luvia? Just to make things clear, I'm not your servant."

"Don't be silly, Rin," she said with her most gracious smile. "Servants get vacations, after all. You, on the other hand, are forever at my beck and call."

"You - !" Rin sputtered as the blonde walked on ahead with a light laugh and a definite spring in her step. At least her confusion about her feelings had evaporated. She absolutely, definitely hated Luvia Edelfelt.

* * *

 **Author's note** : And so the plot finally rears its ugly head. Apologies for the delay in getting this chapter out, life keeps getting in the way. At least it's a longer one this time? Next time we finally get to a certain vampire and all his considerable... quirks. I'll try my best to get it out in a timelier manner.

 **omaomae** , thank you for the review and the kind words. Agreed that Rin's frankly cruel treatment of Sakura in Heaven's Feel is quite off-putting, especially coming on the heels of her sympathetic portrayals in Fate and UBW. I figure though that she made her choice once and for all between being a magus and a human being when she rushed Sakura with Zelretch's blade, and found that in the end, she couldn't bear to hurt her sister. It's an important bit of character development, and one that I want to keep expanding on as this fic moves forward. As for Luvia, in official canon she mostly serves as a foil for Rin, so there's a ton of room for expansion and interpretation. Hopefully I'm not doing too much violence to her character.

 **sen** , thanks for the support.

As well as everyone else who is reading. Feel free to drop me a comment or PM if you have any thoughts.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Rin sat at a small table in Luvia's room and tried to keep from tapping her foot in impatience. She could grudgingly accept the blonde's insistence that explanations wait until they both freshened up, given the torn and burnt state of their clothes. But the delays kept mounting as Luvia took her sweet time rummaging through her bookshelves, and Rin could feel her temper threatening to boil over again.

Just as she was about to snap something, Luvia extracted a volume and placed it on the table, taking a seat as well. Rin sneaked a peek at the faded cover, expecting something in Finnish or Latin, but was confronted with a title written in Cyrillic script.

Luvia placed her elbows on the table and folded her hands together, resting her chin on them. "The man you met tonight was Jacopo Vendramin, patriarch of the Vendramin family of Venice. They're old blood, but they've always been too reclusive and secretive to gain much in the way of political clout," she said, distaste clear in her voice. "Nevertheless, they are dangerous people to cross. Just look at Jacopo's affinity with Imaginary Numbers and those damn shadows of his."

Rin struggled not to show her shock. Imaginary Numbers were a very rare trait, one she had long believed unique to her sister. Now it seemed her life was about to again collide with holders of that rare power. She wondered if it portended good or ill.

The blonde seemed not to notice her companion's inner turmoil as she continued."Within living memory, they have been locked in a bloodthirsty feud with the House of Durnovo from St. Petersburg. You might be familiar with them as distant cousins of your Makiri allies. They also specialize in binding spells, in this case the summoning and command of familiars."

"Never refer to the Makiris as my allies again or I will blast you to ashes, family head or not!" It had slipped out before Rin could stop herself, but she refused to back down as Luvia looked speculatively at her. She would not tolerate being associated with that rotten clan, not while the memory of old Zouken still haunted her nightmares.

"And here I thought you were fond of Matou Sakura."

'That's different! She's a -" Rin stopped herself, but Luvia was already smiling.

"Tohsaka, you were about to say? Do try to be careful; some of our cousins would be only too happy to try and claim her if they ever fully understood her lineage." Luvia ignored Rin's scowl and continued. "The Vendramin and Durnovo accuse each other of an endless parade of crimes, from petty thefts to rapes, tortures and murders. In times past they refused all outside interference in their endless wars against each other, and seemed locked in a stalemate.

But in the last few decades, the Vendramin have found themselves on the back foot. The Durnovos' familiars are spiritual beings, and thus particularly vulnerable to the dark energies generated through Imaginary Numbers." Luvia's previously neutral tone then shifted to real anger as she said, "That is no longer the case since the Durnovo stole what they needed to strengthen their familiars. Now that they don't need to fear retaliation, they've gotten bolder. Their latest outrage has the Vendramin beside themselves with fury."

"So you want the Vendramin to hire you to make up for the power difference."

"Indeed. The Vendramin are being forced, quite against their inclination, to look for help in crushing the Durnovo and recovering their loss. Tonight was Jacopo testing me to see if I could stay cool under unexpected fire. Well, at least he had enough respect to come out and conduct it himself. Anything less against the Edelfelt head would be an insult, after all! Ohohohoho!"

Rin massaged her temple, trying to ward off an oncoming headache. "You intend to take his contract."

"Of course. I have been waiting quite long enough for him to offer it."

"Why this one in particular? It sounds exceptionally dangerous."

"Because what the Durnovo stole to empower their servants rightly belongs to the Edelfelt." Luvia lightly tapped against the book she'd placed on the table. "How familiar are you with magical beasts, Rin?"

Rin's head reeled with the unexpected change of topic. "Pretty much the basics. They're non-human organisms that exist outside the rules of normal biology; everything from fairies to phoenixes." _And horrible worms that latch on and devour people from the inside out, no I don't want to think about them, why did she have to mention the Matou?_ She forced herself to focus. "They say only the weakest of them still survive to the modern age, but they roamed widely in the Mythic Age."

"And what are the greatest of magical beasts?"

"Dragons, of course," Rin answered promptly. Power and splendor incarnate, they appeared in the legends of every human culture and continued to inspire both awe and dread. That brilliance had been reflected in Artoria Pendragon, said to have been infused with the blood of a dragon by Merlin when she was but a child. Saber's golden hair and solemn face had radiated courage and dignity in the face of adversity. Even after she'd fallen, her eyes turned cold and hard and her sword burning black, she had still been magnificent in a fearsome way. The essence of a dragon, a presence so powerful it commands the battlefield even when diluted into a human form.

"Do you recognize this?" Luvia opened the book to a particular page and passed it over to her. The woodcut illustration occupied most of the space, depicting a handsome bearded knight confronting a monstrous three-headed dragon. It was rather more life-like than necessary, all sharp spines and writhing tails and gouts of flame. Rin had studied many legendary knights in her naive conviction that she would summon a Saber for the Holy Grail War, and this one was no exception.

"This is the Bogatyr hero Dobrynya Nikitich, in his battle against the wyrm of the mountains, Zmey Gorynych. What does this have to do with the Durnovos and Edelfelts?"

"As befits our illustrious lineage and our many great deeds, we have accumulated many treasures over the centuries as rewards for our efforts. Among them, we count one of the skulls of Zmey Gorynych itself."

"What?" Rin's head swum as she tried to make sense of this. "But... that's impossible. Such a thing would be - "

"Priceless beyond all jewels, yes. Although but a weak echo of the beast's true power, the skull still holds some of its ancient essence. The echo of Gorynych's dragon breath is a fount of prana, particularly useful for fire magic." She breathed in sharply, her hands clenching into fists. "Or in the case of the Durnovo, enough to impart a shadow of a dragon's power to their summoned familiars. In particular, some of a dragon's magic resistance. That is why the Vendramin's magic, which relies on skill rather than power, lacks the raw punch to deal effectively with the Durnovo's improved monsters."

"And that's why the Vendramin want your help."

"Yes. We will help them infiltrate the Durnovos' stronghold and retrieve the skull. Jacopo can have his son's fiancée back, and whatever else the Durnovo have of worth, but the skull is ours. It belongs to our House. I will redeem my grandfather's mistake by restoring it to its rightful place."

Rin suspected that many other families would contest that claim; it was only too likely that it had belonged to another clan, perhaps even the Durnovo themselves, before the Edelfelts had grabbed it as a trophy in one of their endless raids. But she knew better than to voice this; one might as well argue with the wind as with a magus intent on reclaiming a powerful artifact. Then her brain fully caught up with what Luvia had said.

"Wait, fiancée? The Durnovo abducted one of the Vendramins?"

"Ah, of course you wouldn't know. About a month ago, they made off with Marco Vendramin's intended bride. A no-name girl with some interesting traits, but unfortunately not much in the way of family to help the Vendramin recover her. Hence why they need us."

Luvia closed the book and set it aside. "Now that Jacopo has finally come to his senses and agreed to retain us, things can be set in motion. We need everything he knows about the Durnovo – genealogies, territory layouts, traditional magic forms – as well as what he himself will be contributing. This will allow us to plan our course of action appropriately over the coming months."

"But what about the fiancee? Don't we need to act faster to rescue her?"

"They've either already killed her, or have some interest in keeping her alive. A few weeks won't make much difference."

But Rin knew enough about magi to know that a few weeks could mean a great deal, depending on what the Durnovo had decided to do with the woman. She felt a violent tremor run through her as the image of fat, squirming worms came unbidden to mind. Given that the Durnovos were relatives of the Makiri, however distant, could they be doing something as monstrous as what Zouken had done to her sister? Could it possibly be something even worse?

She closed her eyes and silently counted to ten, in an effort to steady herself, then looked back up to see Luvia staring intently at her. After a few moments, the blonde said quietly, "I would have thought you hardened, as a veteran of a Holy Grail War. However did you survive, with such a soft heart?"

"Huh? No, I tried to - " Rin began to protest that she wasn't soft at all, that she had spent most of the war working to kill both her sister and her secret crush, but cut herself off as she realized that she risked contradicting the official record of events that she had presented at her trial. She looked away awkwardly as Luvia's sharp eyes rested on her for far too long, before the blonde shrugged.

"In any event, the reality is that we aren't nearly ready to take on the Durnovo. We won't be rescuing anybody if we rush in unprepared. If you're so set on saving her, then put forward your best efforts when the time comes."

Rin hesitated. She didn't really want the answer, but she needed to know. "What's my role in all of this?"

"I haven't decided yet. For now, focus on your studies and try to stay out of trouble. I'll tell you more if and when you need to know it." Luvia stood up and stretched her shoulders. "It's getting quite late. Do close the door on your way out."

"Right." Rin knew when she was being dismissed. As much as she hated being ordered around, she had a lot of information that she badly needed to digest. She returned to her room and mechanically went through the motions of preparing for sleep, trying to ignore her sense of creeping dread.

She'd known the Edelfelts worked as mercenaries, but until now she hadn't really thought about what that might mean for her personally. She should have known that after her experience in the War, they would consider her for a combat role. To bloody her hands for glory and coin, in service of a series of murderous feuds and grudges as meaningless as the Holy Grail's promise turned out to be.

There might still be a way of escaping that fate. Luvia had said she hadn't yet decided on Rin's role. There was a chance of convincing her that Rin was best suited for magical research, like her Tohsaka ancestors, ensuring a future in laboratories rather than battlefields. She could still save herself.

And abandon Vendramin's fiancée, and everyone else that continued to suffer at the hands of magi and their machinations. No matter how much she tried to tell herself it wasn't her problem, she couldn't dispel the image of a young woman even now chained to a blood-soaked table, or forced a slow drip of venomous green liquid, or locked in a black pit just _screaming and screaming._

What a sorry magus she was turning out to be. Her father would have been disappointed.

 _If I'm to be a fool, at least I can be a thoughtful one_. As much as she hated to admit it, Luvia was right to advise against rushing in with nothing but good intentions. If she wanted to stop abuses of magecraft, including the dismantling of the accursed Greater Grail, she would have to accomplish her goals slowly and methodically. A tall order while working under the Edelfelts' boot, but she had to try.

She gave up on sleep and stared blankly up at the ceiling. "Dammit, when did Emiya's hero complex rub off on me?"

* * *

Luvia was seated at the vanity, absently combing out her long hair while she replayed the recent conversation in her head. Every time she thought she had the Tohsaka magus pinned down, an unexpected reaction forced her to revise her opinion. It seemed that despite recent events, the girl lacked the merciless edge that was normally cultivated by the great families. A sign of the shoddy upbringing to be expected from upstart commoners, but refreshing in comparison to the bloodlust so often exhibited by her closer relations. She found herself strangely pleased, even though it would prove an obstacle to making effective use of the girl's talents.

A knock at the door interrupted her thoughts. As obviously upset as Rin had seemed at Luvia's breakdown of the situation, she seemed more the kind to ruminate in silence than to immediately return with questions. Which meant that this could only be one person. "Come on in, Mikael."

The man took a seat at the table, his eyes brimming with excitement. "I heard the news from Aleksi after he woke up. So Vendramin talked to you? Do we have the contract?"

Luvia quirked an eyebrow as she pivoted to face him. "You don't seem overly worried about my well-being, given I was recently under attack by one of the premier users of shadow magic in the Magus Association."

"Of course not. The Vendramin are talented to be sure, but you are the heir of Edelfelt. Not to mention you obviously returned safely, or we wouldn't be having this conversation. So?"

"Jacopo said he would be in touch. That's not binding, but... " she allowed herself a pleased smile. "Yes, I think it's pretty safe to say that we have our contract."

Mikael beamed. "Excellent, excellent. I've been looking forward to striking the fear of God into those Russian vermin." He patted the bulge in his coat lovingly. "It's been too long since we've had a little practice, she and I." He leaned back in his chair and gave Luvia a sly smile. "And quite a win for you as well. If we can recover the skull, few of the elders would dare question your authority."

"Never underestimate Aunt Sanni's ability to denigrate my achievements," she laughed, "But yes, it would be quite the coup."

Mikael grinned and opened his mouth to say something more, when his gaze happened to fall across the book of Russian folktales that Luvia had neglected to put away. His expression immediately sobered as he picked it up, letting it fall open naturally to the well-worn page of knight and dragon. "Aleksi mentioned that you were with Tohsaka when the attack happened. Just how much did you explain to her?"

"I told her what she needed to grasp the situation."

"If you talked about the skull, then you told her far more than she needed to know." He frowned at her. "Why do you insist on treating her as a confidante? Information is ammunition, and you're only giving her more opportunities for treachery."

"I must disagree with you. Tohsaka's type is burdened with insatiable curiousity; keeping her in the dark will only infuriate her and foster rebellion. Conversely, showing her respect by explaining things will help compel her sense of honour, and thus her obedience."

Mikael shrugged in resignation. "Fine, you've chosen to ignore me, and now all I can do is look forward to saying I told you so. I just wish I knew how she managed to glue those rose-coloured glasses so firmly to your eyes."

"Maybe I've taken a fancy to her."

"I certainly hope not, for all our sakes."

"Don't look so grim, Mikael; I was only joking. Trust my instincts in these matters, as I trust yours when it comes to battle. Won't you help me fire up the war machine?"

Mikael snorted, but she could see him begin to recover some of his earlier animation. "With pleasure. We'll give those Durnovo bastards the shock of their lives."

And as he began pouring over plans and strategies, Luvia stifled a yawn as she felt weariness steadily creeping over her. She already knew, from the eager gleam in her cousin's eye, that she would be getting very little sleep that night.

* * *

The next morning found Rin walking towards the less-traveled rooms in the Clocktower's eastern wing, where tutorial rooms had hastily been freed up for the Wizard Marshall. Never a morning person at the best of times, a restless night and insistent drumming at her door at an ungodly hour (and she knew perfectly well who had put Aleksi up to that) had put her even more out of sorts than usual. She was about to have her first lesson with a being of immense power, one of the Five Magicians and her ancestor's master , and all she could think about was coffee. Somebody was going to pay for this, assuming she came out of this encounter with all her limbs and sanity intact.

Well, she'd managed on even less sleep during the War. She could do this. She took a deep breath and knocked on the heavy oak door, waiting for an invitation to enter.

And waited.

She mentally retraced her steps, comparing them to the instructions she'd received. No, this was definitely the place. Which meant that this was probably a test of patience, or respect, or some other rubbish intended to remind students of their place.

 _Well, screw that_. Sleep starvation combined with anger and lingering anxiety to make her forget both her magus training and survival instincts. Rin grabbed the handle and forcefully pushed the door, fully expecting it to be locked.

To her surprise, it opened readily and she had to hastily catch her footing to avoid falling into the darkened room. The only light came from a nearby fireplace in the opposite wall, partially blocked from her sight by a set of the bulky armchairs favoured by so many magi. As her eyes adjusted to the dimness, she noted hangings with the Pentel family crest, and shelves lined with treatises on various elemental affinities. Apparently Zelretch had not even bothered getting rid of the stray belongings of the previous owner.

Closer inspection of the armchairs proved that one was currently occupied by the vampire, only his dark sleeve and white glove visible from her angle. She was about to discreetly cough to get his attention, when he airily waved his hand.

"I understand you placed yourself under the Edelfelts."

"Yes," she said tightly, realizing that she should have prepared for this. After all, he had only just acknowledged her as the heir of Tohsaka Nagato before she had thrown it away to align herself with another clan. It was only too likely that he would revoke his offer of apprenticeship.

The vampire was silent for what seemed like an age, and Rin did her best to stop herself from fidgeting. As the time seemed to stretch on, and her legs increasingly hurt from standing in one place, she felt her resentment build. Why didn't he just turn her out already, and stop wasting time?

"It was not a choice that most magi would have made."

"I don't care! I had my reasons. If I'm such a disappointment, just say so and I'll see myself out," she snapped, her exhaustion overcoming her sense as irritation flashed through her. A moment later, she turned pale as realization set in. She had just been rude to Kischur Zelretch Schweinorg, Zelretch of the Jewels himself, one of the twenty-seven Dead Apostle Ancestors.

Fortunately he didn't seem to mind. "I said an unusual choice, not an incorrect one. Relax, child. Why don't you pull up a chair and join me?"

She hesitated, then steeled herself before walking across and taking a stiff seat in the armchair across from the vampire. His eyes were half-glazed as he gazed at the fire, brows furrowed in contemplation.

"Tell me, apprentice. Do you believe in fate?"

"What?" She blinked in surprise. "No, I don't. That's an odd question coming from you, isn't it? If parallel worlds differ from each other based on what choices were made, then that shows that nothing is set in stone."

"And yet with infinite worlds, infinite chances to make a certain choice, then that choice will inevitably occur somewhere. Every permutation of every possible outcome exists somewhere in the Kaleidoscope. Could each of those permutations, then, be considered as fated in the underlying nature of the multiverse?"

"I... well, I suppose that's the nature of infinity. That given enough iterations, every possible choice will be made at least once. But that doesn't impact the choice you make in any one particular world."

"Are you so sure?" he asked mildly, "That view assumes that each parallel world is its own existence, separate and indifferent to what occurs in the others. Consider how your answer might change if parallel worlds can and do interact. Such as, say, drawing mana from one world to fuel magic in another."

Her mind was dragged back to the cave under the Ryuudou Temple. An army of tenebrous giants, held barely at bay by a blade flashing with all the colours of a hidden rainbow. The muscles of her left arm ached in memory of the strain she had put on them. How much mana had she drained, from how many worlds, in that desperate last stand? It hadn't seemed like much, surely not enough to change a world; but even a small change at a critical time -

Zelretch watched in silence as Rin's discomfort grew, before abruptly standing from his chair. His black cape billowed around his shoulders as he met her gaze. His unnatural blood-red eyes seemed to bore into her as he spoke. "The Second Magic is a powerful force, and difficult to control. There are many consequences for carelessness, and not just for a single world. Reflect on that before deciding whether you truly want to follow my lessons."

He reached for his cane and motioned towards a set of doors at the other end of the room. "For the time being, come with me. If you do decide to continue your studies with me, then I must insist that you work nearby. That will make it much more convenient when I inevitably need to intervene to correct one of your mishaps."

Rin wanted to argue that she didn't intend on any mishaps, but decided she probably shouldn't push her luck any further that day. Besides, from faulty summonings to combat fumbles, she didn't exactly have a flawless track record.

Zelretch led her through to what appeared to be a comfortable and well-equipped workshop, if rather larger than the norm. She noted with satisfaction that there was plenty of shelf space, a stock of standard reagents, two separate desks with accompanying chairs... wait.

"... why are there two sets of desks? You're not intending me to share this workshop, are you?"

"Space is always at a premium in the Clocktower. While it's true that most magi are so paranoid about their family secrets that they cannot stand to work near each other," he shook his head in distaste, "fortunately that shouldn't be a problem for Miss Edelfelt and yourself."

"Of course it's a problem! How can I possibly concentrate with that blonde hyena around?"

"How many times will you need to work magic under difficult conditions? Think of this as part of your training. Unless you want to give up?"

Rin slammed her bag down on the nearest desk and started setting out her notebooks with rather more force than necessary. _Space is at a premium, my ass_. As if the Wizard Marshall couldn't simply snap his fingers and commandeer half the floor, so great was the Magus Association's fear of him.

 _Nevermind_ , she thought fiercely as she started organizing crystals on the shelves, _I'm going to do what I came here for._ And no number of racist instructors, damnable vampires, or infuriating family heads were going to keep her from it.

* * *

 **Author's note:** And here I said I would try to get this chapter out sooner rather than later! In my defense, the exposition monster kept bloating itself until it forced me to split the chapter in two. The good news is that the next part is largely written, so hopefully out sooner. I know, I know, eternal optimism...

To those folks disappointed that I didn't write Rin's pledging ceremony last chapter, I was originally planning to but decided against it since it was turning into an unholy fest of OCs and bad Finnish. I thought I would just hint at the highlights and spare everyone the rest. I'll keep the comments in mind and be sure to include such scenes moving forward.

If anyone feels that Luvia and Rin constantly referring to the Durnovos' abductee as "the fiancee" or "the woman" rather than by her name as rather dehumanizing, you're absolutely right. One of the things about treating people the way many magi do is that you have to start looking at them as objects. They're slowly getting better, but old habits and training do die hard.

 **FishyFod:** Thank you so much for the feedback! Characterization is such a tricky thing, especially with multiple routes and AUs that inevitably leak into the way we see these characters. I'll try my best as this beast slowly crawls its way forward.

I can't really take credit for Luvia's initial hostility to good old Waver (he's one of my favourites too), that comes from the Lord El-Melloi II Case Files. But it seems so like her, and for exactly the reason you mention, that I couldn't resist incorporating it here.

Gah, you are entirely correct about Shirou and his magic circuits. It's pretty funny that I spent all that effort trying to make sure that I got my Clocktower canon sorted out, only to completely drop the ball on the main HF story! As tempted as I am to go back and do some edits, that feels like cheating and I want people who read your comment to understand what you're referring to. Since Shirou is largely Sir-Not-Appearing-in-this-Fic, maybe we just call it a slight AU and leave it at that?

As for other Rin/Luvia fics, if you are thinking of Mongol's excellent work over at AO3, you can pretty much blame them for the existence of this fic. I wasn't terribly fond of Luvia until I read their work, and now I pretty much can't stop shipping these two. Argh.

 **Omaomae** : Many thanks! I'm constantly worried that I get overly wordy, or that I'm dipping into purple prose. And I haven't even hit any adult scenes yet. And your Mt. Everest analogy is just perfect!

Hey, if I could be lured into liking Luvia, maybe you can too! We can board this ship together.

 **Guest** : So yuri it hurts. But hopefully in a good way.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

As it turned out, Luvia was not best pleased to be sharing workshop space either, judging from her stiff jaw and tensed shoulders when Zelretch gave her the news. But she settled into the opposite desk with no complaint, apparently determined to handle it as graciously as possible. Or maybe, Rin reflected with a snort, the blonde was just trying to make her look bad in comparison.

As unwelcome as her fellow apprentice was in her study space, as least she was quiet. Luvia could read a complicated treatise for hours on end, with little sound but the occasional sigh or steady scratch of a pencil. Even when she needed to make use of a magic circle or alchemical reagents, she performed her work with the silent focus that was instilled in properly trained magi from a young age. Despite her initial protests, Rin found that as the days went by, she had little trouble concentrating on her work; in fact, some days she forgot there was another person in the room at all.

Which was just as well, considering the frustrating results of her recent experiments. While gems had long been used to store raw mana by magi specializing in jewelcraft, there was the enticing possibility that they could also be used to absorb mana in manifested forms. If so, properly prepared gems could potentially drain enemy attacks, consume curses, or a myriad of other defensive or healing work. The theory was hardly new, as evidenced by the research papers she found among the shelves of the Department of Mineralogy, but empirical testing did not seem to have progressed as far as she would have thought over the last decades. The more promising treatises were piled on the corner of her desk while she worked through replicating their trials.

Currently she was exploring the extent to which properly prepared aquamarines could be used to absorb firebolts sent from her fingertips. So far she had ended up mostly with a series of shattered stones and erratic scorch marks covering her work area, but she was already learning quite a bit. The cut of the gem seemed to have disproportionately more impact than its size, which was interesting -

"Friedrich Istari's _D_ _e elementis philosophiae_?" Just what are you up to, Tohsaka Rin?"

Rin blinked, then looked over her shoulder to see Luvia leafing through the alchemical text she had been working from. She frowned. "Working, unlike you."

Luvia, damn her, ignored the dig in favour of giving Rin a sardonic smile as she waved a hand over the wasteland of shards littering the desk. "As Istari says, absorption and manipulation of mana is closely associated with the element of water. But why are you using aquamarines? Even though you were raised by wolves, surely you know that despite its evocative name, aquamarine is nowhere near as effective as blue sapphire or tanzanite for this kind of magic."

"I'm well aware of that," replied Rin through gritted teeth, "but we don't all have bottomless pockets. Ever since that fake priest ruined the family investments, I can't afford to use my best gems on exploratory phases."

"Unacceptable." Luvia carefully placed the book back on top of the stack balanced on the desk. "I will expect a complete list of the gemstones you require for your studies by the end of today."

"I don't need any charity," said Rin testily.

"It isn't a matter of charity. Whether you like it or not, you are a part of the Edelfelt family now. I won't have any of ours caught using substandard materials, especially in our field of expertise. It reflects badly on the family as a whole." Without waiting for a reply, Luvia sauntered from the room, leaving behind her a lingering scent of spring roses.

Rin's certainty that she was happy to see the back of her was rather ruined when she caught herself breathing in deeply to catch the last hints of the blonde's perfume. When had she gone from gagging on it to actively enjoying the unique floral scent? Gathering the frayed edges of her temper, she snatched up a piece of paper, fully intending to soak that blonde bimbo for all she was worth.

Unbelievably, she found herself hesitating as she moved to put ink to page. She tapped the pen for a few moments, sifting through her emotions before deciding on an acceptable reason for her doubts. A big extravagant list was probably exactly what Luvia was expecting. Probably looking forward to mocking her for it too. Well, Rin wasn't going to give her that satisfaction. She stared ahead for long minutes, doing a set of intricate mental calculations before she picked up her pen and carefully began filling out her list.

* * *

Luvia felt both admiration and an undercurrent of unease as she read through the list. She had expected an extensive catalogue of rare gemstones designed to dent even the Edelfelt's extensive coffers; the starting point in a back-and-forth that would eventually whittle the list down to something reasonable and give her many opportunities to mock Tohsaka along the way. Instead, she was confronted with a detailed list of stones of various rarities and values, with a short description of how each would be used in her research projects. Energy absorption, manipulation of mana flows … there was no denying the girl's keen mind, or her determination to apply it. Too much determination; if Tohsaka Rin had remained an enemy, Luvia would have had to seriously consider her elimination.

She knew full well that violence was a necessary part of her family's business, but that didn't stop her stomach from clenching painfully at the thought. Watching those bright eyes go glassy, their greedy intelligence draining out of them forever … she huffed and returned to the list, eager for a distraction from that unwelcome train of thought.

The last entry was especially unusual, asking for large blocks of exceptionally clear quartz as well as an assortment of gems of all colours, all of the same size and cut to the same extremely exacting measurements, down to the micrometer. She glanced to the side for an explanation, but all that was written by way of description was "special project". Luvia stared at it for a moment, trying to imagine what Rin could possibly want with this odd assortment, before shrugging and signing her approval at the bottom.

She thought little more about the matter until the next day, which found her struggling to make sense of some obscure bit of alchemical formula. Well, not _struggling_ obviously, but experiencing some temporary setbacks of a most vexing nature. She sighed and leaned back in her seat, rolling her shoulders back in attempt to ease some of their stiffness. "Clear as dish water. What a pity that proper writing is not considered an essential skill for researchers."

To her surprise, Rin made a noise of sympathy from across the room. "It does sometimes feel like they take a sadistic joy in making us sweat, doesn't it?" The black-haired girl walked over and peered down at the book "Do you mind if I have a look?"

Luvia hesitated, but shrugged when she couldn't see any obvious trap. "If it pleases you. It purports to be a further exploration of Johann of Laz's transmutations, but I will admit that I am having some difficulty following the operations."

Rin let her finger follow along the some of the described transformations – the writing was quite cramped, as if the author had tried to fit as much on each page as humanly possible. "And no wonder, this jumps around all over the place. Maybe try cross-referencing it to Zetzner's _Theatrum Chemicum_? It covers a lot of the same ground, and it probably has some of the missing steps."

"I will have a look." Luvia made a note, then leaned back and fixed Rin with a level stare. "Why are you helping? I wasn't under the impression that you were overly fond of me."

"It's not like that!" said Rin, looking resolutely off to the side. "Like you said the other day, you're my family head, whether I like it or not. Your success and failures reflect on me too. So it's in my self-interest to help you out."

"I see." Luvia was not a stranger to face-saving excuses, and it was honestly rather cute how Rin was refusing to look her in the eye, the beginnings of a pout on that pretty face. It was hard to resist playing with her a bit, to see if she could get that delightful temper to flare up again. "Nevertheless, thank you. I'm sure this will save me a lot of time." When the other girl turned back to reply, Luvia flashed her most charming smile, the one that had once compelled a boy across two lanes of traffic.

She had reasonably expected the girl to be annoyed, but not the blush that quickly spread across her rival's face. The effect was startling; the faint tint of red combined with her widened eyes giving her an uncharacteristic vulnerability, a reminder that for all her practiced cynicism, she was still a young woman seeking her place in the world. And an attractive one at that, with tresses of spilled ink that just begged to be wrapped around a finger. Luvia blinked as she realized she had been staring longer than intended, and felt a touch of heat blossom on her own cheeks.

"R – right then. Let's get back to it." Rin returned to her seat and went to place another gem in her apparatus, her hands unsteady as they worked the clamp. Luvia cleared her throat and turned back to her papers, a little unsure of what had just happened. The customary silence descended on the room, but it was a new sort of tension that subtly charged the air between them.

* * *

Rin felt a sense of relief (and certainly no regret, she assured herself) as she excused herself from the workshop to run her necessary errands. _Damn it, she's doing it on purpose!_ Somehow the blonde bimbo always managed to throw her off balance, with a seemingly endless repertoire of dirty tricks. She'd been prepared for a biting remark, or studied indifference; anything but that brilliant smile that had disarmed Rin more easily than any explosive jewel. _She's the enemy_ , she reminded herself sternly, _she threatened Sakura and ruined your life. This is just another way of messing with you_.

The best response was to pay it as little mind as possible. She was a busy magus and she had important things to do. Important things that did not involve a certain snooty, interfering, unfairly gorgeous young heiress.

The sight of Lord El-Melloi II's office door was thus a welcome sight. She had been waiting some time for the professor to grant her a meeting outside of his regular office hours, but she had little choice. They couldn't exactly have this conversation in front of an audience, for both of their sakes. She knocked briefly on the door before letting herself in.

She found the man hunched over his desk marking papers, dressed in black with a long red scarf draped loosely around his shoulders. The long black hair framing his face like curtains made it difficult to see his expression as his pen scratched away, but she didn't need to see his face to know it would be set in his ever-present frown.

Rin took a seat at the end of the desk and waited, suppressing a sigh. Must every instructor at the Clocktower insist on making her wait before gracing her with their attention? But perhaps some standoffishness was only to be expected. With Kirei's little-lamented death, Lord El-Melloi II – once known simply as Waver Velvet – was the last survivor of the Fourth Holy Grail War.

Her late guardian hadn't bothered telling her many details about that conflict, but it had likely been a bloody affair. Her presence could only be dredging up bad memories, even putting aside that she was the daughter of Tohsaka Tokiomi. While perhaps not as overbearing as the former holder of the title, the late Kayneth El-Melloi Archibald, her father still represented the old guard of the Magus Association, whose narrow adherence to tradition her professor struggled against even now. To make matters worse, if he'd had any doubts as to what kind of person Rin was, she had probably clinched things when she offered her allegiance to the Edelfelt clan, a family that exemplified the obsession with bloodlines and tradition.

With one last flick of red ink, Lord El-Melloi II pushed his document aside and looked coolly over his desk. "Miss Tohsaka. As you insisted on visiting outside of office hours, I presume this doesn't have to do with your essay."

"No. I came to ask you for a favour."

By the unspoken rules of the political games constantly played in the Magus Association, she was taking a terrible risk by showing her hand so openly. Proper procedure would have been to drop discrete hints and curry favours and the like for months before she made her approach. But if Luvia decided to involve her directly in the fight against the Durnovos, then there was a real possibility of sudden death. She simply didn't have the time to play games.

"Oh?" he sounded bored, idly reaching for another paper. "Won't the Wizard Marshall be insulted when he learns that you've been looking for another mentor?"

Rin held her breath until the small spike of sullen anger dissipated and she could trust herself to keep a level tone. "Not that. I understand that you first became aware of the Fuyuki Holy Grail Wars through texts here at the Clocktower, right? I want your help in destroying as many of them as possible, to leave as little trace of the ritual as we can manage."

She watched in some satisfaction as he put down his paper, his dark green eyes widening in surprise, before his face settled into a thoughtful expression. "You said at your trial that the Greater Grail was destroyed, the mechanisms of the ritual obliterated. Was that a lie?"

"No, it's true. At very high cost, but it's finally gone." Through a chain of painful sacrifices; first Emiya ripping his own mind and body apart to stop the Greater Grail from birthing a god of destruction, then Ilyasviel giving up what was left of her short life to save her younger brother. _Oh Ilya_. Rin had never gotten along with the brat, but even she could sorrow at the cruelty of the young homunculus' fate. She reminded herself that trying to prevent similar injustices was the point of this whole effort, and forced herself to go on. "It's gone, but with enough greed and ambition, it's not beyond modern magi to recreate something like it. Maybe something even worse. I might not be able to stop it, but I can at least make it harder."

"I never thought I would hear the heir of Tohsaka call for the dismantling of a system that could potentially reach the Root. Wasn't that your father's life work?"

"My father was wrong." Even after everything she had learnt about him, about his feet of clay, it still hurt to criticize him. But a bitter truth was still the truth. "Sometimes our goals come with too high a price. The Grail was hopelessly corrupted. Even if it was possible to use it to open a door to Akasha, it wouldn't have been worth all the ruin and suffering it would bring with it."

"I see. No wish could be untainted by the weakness of the human –"

"No! I mean, maybe, but the Grail was actively corrupted. It absorbed something unspeakably evil along the way. Angra Mainyu. All the World's Evils." She shuddered. She was now firmly off-script from the official record, but she had to take the risk. She had to make him understand the magnitude of what had almost been birthed from the Grail, and could still be birthed by other rituals like it. "It almost destroyed Fuyuki, and it could have easily swallowed all of humanity. No wish could have come from it that would not have carried that destroying madness."

"Emiya Kiritsugu… is that why you destroyed the Grail?" His eyes looked distant for a moment, before he gave a long sigh. "Assuming what you say is true, then the issue was the Grail's corruption. Why would you take issue with a renewed ritual, free of that taint?" His eyes were cold and assessing.

"The Grail ritual was brutal by design, and I've had enough brutality for several lifetimes. What good is enlightenment predicated on betrayal and sacrifice, built on the backs of suffering humans and spirits? If that's the only way to reach the Root, then I don't want it." And there it was, the ultimate betrayal of both her upbringing and her family's creed; generations of her ancestors were rolling in their graves. But she couldn't find it within herself to regret it.

"I find that an odd perspective coming from someone who joined up with the Edelfelts."

"It is, isn't it? We all end up doing things we never thought we would in the name of necessity. In my case, it's all I could do to make up for years of neglect." It still stung a bit to admit her defeat to Luvia, but not as much as it once did. "That's why I need your help. With all the Edelfelts' mercenary work, there's no guarantee I'll be around long enough to see this done."

"You're a coward."

Rin gaped at him.

He shrugged. "If you feel this strongly about the remnants of the Grail ritual, and what might come out of it, then you owe a duty to survive and do something about it yourself. Don't try to dump all the responsibility on me."

She stared at him a moment longer, then swallowed hard. "Thank you. I think I needed that."

Lord-El Melloi II gave her a small smile. "You'll need a lot of grit and foresight if you're planning to do this under the gaze of Luviagelita Edelfelt. She watches you like a hawk –"

"She does not!" squawked Rin, flushing in embarrassment.

"- and it's unlikely that someone that greedy will want to give up even the chance at recreating something as valuable as the Grail ritual."

"She's not that bad. It's true that many of the Edelfelts are sharks, but she isn't one of them. At least not so much as to ignore common sense," she protested, even as she wondered why she was bothering to defend her tormentor.

"You'll have plenty of opportunities to judge for yourself. In any case, come back when you have a solid plan on how you propose to move forward."

"I'll keep that in mind," said Rin, standing up and automatically giving him a slight bow before she remembered differences in custom. He waved it off, looking more amused than anything else, and she turned to leave.

As her fingers touched the polished brass of the door handle, the professor cleared his throat. "One last thing." He spoke almost hesitantly as she looked at him, his practiced grimace at odds with the wistful look in his eyes. "What was your Rider like? The Rider in your War, I mean."

Ah, there was a complicated question. Even now she sometimes found it difficult to reconcile the terrible killer of the early nights of the War, cloaked in shadows and smelling of blood, with the loyal spirit whose entire wish had been to protect Sakura as best she could. A monster who would forever regret her past crimes, even while she reluctantly committed more in the name of saving a tormented girl, abandoned by those that called themselves her family. "She was very dangerous, and she didn't say much. But you could never fault her courage or her loyalty; she always believed in her master, even at the end when her master stopped believing in herself."

She paused, wondering if she should say more, but she had already lost him. He was thinking of another battlefield, an indescribable longing in his eyes, and she briefly wondered what his servant must have been like, to inspire such emotion even across the span of years.

As she softly exited the room and pulled the door shut, she wondered what Emiya would someday say if he were asked about Saber. Not that she wanted to ask anytime soon; the wound was too recent and too painful. Much as the grief she still carried for a certain red-clad bastard –

"Miss Rin Tohsaka?"

She cursed herself for being so lost in her thoughts that she had completely missed the other student until he had actively waved her down. At this rate she would be lucky to survive another week in the Clocktower halls, let alone whatever monstrosities the Durnovos had in store.

She gave him a practiced smile as he approached. "Yes, how can I help you?"

The boy looked to be about a year or so younger, dressed in gray slacks and a blue wool sweater that was starting to look a little threadbare around the elbows. He scanned her face nervously, then set his mouth in a grim line as he extended a hand towards her. "I'm Elias Lund, I sit behind you in Modern Magecraft Theories. I had something I wanted to ask you." His voice was hoarse, as if he were recovering from a recent illness, with just a hint of a slavic accent.

She nodded encouragingly as she shook his hand, remembering her instructions to be courteous even as she mentally raised her guard. "Of course. Walk with me while we discuss it?"

He seemed relieved as he matched her pace, falling naturally alongside her. "Thank you, but let's not move not too quickly. The office area has charms that make it difficult to be overheard. It's meant to discourage academic fraud, but it's useful for other sensitive topics too."

It was a little disappointing, but not surprising, that he had an ulterior motive in approaching her. At least he had enough sense to be direct about it. "Out with it, then."

"It's not everyday that someone from the old families willingly talks to Professor Velvet. They don't usually much care for what he has to say."

"I try to keep an open mind."

"As open as the Edelfelts will let you have, anyway."

She sighed in annoyance. Had he requested this discussion just so he could make a petty attempt at picking a fight? "If that's all you have to say -"

"No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way." His eyes darted this way and that, ensuring that the hallway was clear, before he steadied himself and spoke in a low voice. "I know you're not with them by choice. They're masters of blackmail, and you're not the only one they've sunk their claws into." He laughed ruefully. "I thought I was safe from them because my family only goes back four generations, and we have no relics or property worth mentioning. But it turns out you don't stay rich by neglecting any opportunity for profit, however small."

"What, they're threatening you for your pocket money?"

"For my father's connections, if you must know." His face twisted into a scowl. "The details aren't really fit for polite company, and I'd rather not spread them further than necessary."

"Why are you telling me this? I could easily rat you out."

"Go ahead, it's not like they don't know that I hate them. And I'm tired of constantly living under their thumb. I'd rather take a risk for a chance at revenge then spend the rest of my life crawling at Mikael Edelfelt's feet." He looked at her wearily. "Your families have been rivals for ages, right? I don't know what they have over you, but it must have been pretty bad if you were forced into total surrender."

She couldn't quite stop her fist from clenching as she looked fixedly ahead. "I'll think about it."

"You're right to be cautious, and I won't push you. There's no need to rush," he noted bitterly, "the jackals aren't going anywhere. Just remember they have other enemies if you ever decide you've had enough." With that, he turned a corner away from her and disappeared into the maze of hallways.

* * *

"Here you are, Miss Luvia." Emmi delicately poured the cup of Darjeeling tea and added just the right amount of milk and sugar, years of practice allowing the maid to perfectly match her mistress' preferences. The blonde allowed herself a pleased sigh as she sipped the flavourful liquid. There was just something so civilized about afternoon tea properly served and enjoyed.

It was all the sweeter when there was someone to share it with, even if that someone was a sullen Japanese magus. Emmi, ever the diligent servant, had quickly learned the new cousin's tastes through observation and had since refused to let her serve herself, citing her pride as an Edelfelt retainer. Rin acquiesced as gracefully as she could, but her lingering awkwardness showed that she still wasn't used to being waited on. It was rather fun to see the proud girl taken off balance by something so simple.

"I trust you've completed whatever errands were so important that you went without lunch for them?"

"Pretty much."

"Good, because Jacopo is finally starting to deliver what he promised." She waved over to her desk, where a sizable stack of documents had taken over most of the space. Most inelegant, but unavoidable until it had all been duly copied and distributed. "Personnel files, maps, financial records and so on. Clear some space in your schedule, because you'll be reading all of them in the coming week."

"Tch. I'll do my best, but it depends on what Zelretch means by 'practical lessons' coming up."

They exchanged a knowing look. The Wizard Marshall's lessons were well-known for having brought past students to the brink of insanity or worse. While both magi were hungry to learn his craft, they were also anxious about what exactly their studies would entail.

"We'll manage," said Luvia finally, tossing a lock of hair over her shoulder dismissively. "We come from a bloodline renowned for tenacity and ingenuity alike. We will succeed brilliantly where lesser minds have failed."

"Stuck-up as always," observed Rin, but without any real heat. But then, good tea did wonders for the girl's nerves. "At least I can't fault your confidence."

"Ohohoho! Confidence and ability together can move mountains, as you will soon see."

They sipped their tea in comfortable silence for a few minutes, until Rin shifted in her seat. "By the way, one of our fellow students approached me today with a vague plot for unspecified vengeance against you in the future."

"Oh?" Luvia took a relaxed sip of tea. Well, her family was unpopular for a myriad of reasons, and cloak and dagger games common in the halls of the Magus Association. She hadn't expected this for at least another month, but apparently someone was the impatient type.

"Yep. I'm pretty sure he was trying hard to make me think he was from the Durnovos, accent and everything. I assume this is some kind of test from the Vendramin, or maybe one of your other enemies. God knows you have enough of them to field a small army."

"Envy is such an ugly thing, is it not?" she laughed. "So what did you say to him?"

"I told him I'd consider it. There might be an opportunity to play along and draw out whoever put him up to it."

"That won't be necessary, thank you. I suspect it would be more trouble than it's worth." She folded her hands under her chin and considered the other girl. "Didn't you want to investigate his offer more carefully before coming to me? Crude as his approach was, he might have been able to give you a genuine shot at revenge."

Rin shook her head. "It's almost certainly a trap. Even if it wasn't, I'd still reject it." She glared across at Luvia. "You're my family head now. Whatever I may think of that, my loyalty is pledged to you."

"Thank you. I'm glad at least somebody understands the paramount importance of duty over personal sentiments. Some of our other relations could stand to learn that lesson."

"Also, you're not a monster," muttered the other girl, so low that Luvia barely caught it.

She blinked and placed her cup on her saucer. "What did you just say?"

"Don't get me wrong. I'm never going to forgive you for what you did. You're arrogant, perverse, insufferable -"

"That's quite enough -" she growled, but Rin continued as if she hadn't heard.

"- but you're not a monster. I know there's lots of people who want you to be – I met them in Turku, remember – but you aren't. And I don't think you want to be."

Luvia scowled at the girl, searching her face for any trace of mockery. Finding none, she settled back into her seat, her thoughts straying to a similar discussion she'd once had with her father. It was uncomfortable, and that in turn made her angry. "Don't talk nonsense. A magus needs to be a realist, and especially the heir to a magus family. I'm willing to do whatever it takes."

"I'm not saying you won't make hard choices when you have to. Emiya's as idealistic as they come, and even he knew he had to kill Saber. If he hadn't, who knows what would have happened." Now that was interesting; Rin never spoke about the War if she could help it, and it seemed to pain her to mention it now.

Before Luvia could ask further, Rin shrugged and rose from her seat."I'm just saying, before you make the hard choice, make sure it's for something that's actually worth it." She sighed and put a hand to the back of her neck, straightening out a kink. "Anyway, I'm hungry after skipping lunch. I'll ask Emmi about finding something in the kitchens. If you'll excuse me."

Luvia watched her go, still feeling irritated at the girl's presumption. Her life had always seemed to be straightforward before meeting the Tohsaka heir, and she resented feeling like the concrete under her feet was shifting away like so much sand. She picked up an opened letter from her desk, marked with the stylized letter "V" that represented Jacopo's personal seal. So Rin thought she knew it all, did she? A mission might be just what she needed to remind her of the realities of magus life.

She took a moment to steady her resolve, then called for Emmi and instructed the maid to fetch Mikael. The man in question appeared a scant ten minutes later, smelling of fresh sweat and cigarette smoke. "Training," he offered in response to her raised eyebrow.

She decided to let it go. She had other fish to fry with him at the moment. "Mikael," she said sweetly, "Did you know Tohsaka was just here informing me that she's being recruited into a plot against us?"

Her cousin had worked with her long enough to recognize that tone of voice as a danger sign, but he didn't flinch. "Is that so? Would you like me to track them down? I can make them grovel at your feet."

"No need," she replied coldly. "The saving grace is that she assumed the messenger was sent by the Vendramin, or one of our rivals. I would be mortified if she knew that the Edelfelt family could be so ham-fisted when it came to tests of loyalty."

He had the decency to look embarrassed. "I thought-"

"No, you didn't think. You were so eager to prove me wrong, you went ahead with a scheme that frankly needed a lot more polish. Now she's going to be on her guard, and it will be harder to set up a proper test in the future." She sighed. "Let's just hope my reading of her is as accurate as I think it is. In the meantime, I think some punishment is in order."

"I stand ready to accept whatever my family head deems suitable."

"Good. Then you won't mind Tohsaka replacing you as Marco Vendramin's escort." She tapped the letter meaningfully. "After all, Jacopo didn't specify who I should send on this little side mission."

"That's not fair!" Mikael's usual composure fell away, and he looked for all the world like a young boy having his favourite toy taken away, "I've been looking forward to this."

"This will give you a chance to cool your head. Besides, I don't think you were entirely wrong to want to test her mettle. Let me explain."

As they sat across from each other and Luvia laid out her plan, his disgruntled frown gradually turned into pleased smirk. Perhaps this punishment had a bit of a silver lining after all.

* * *

 **Author's note** : You guys, this chapter was supposed to be out ages ago, but I kept scrapping and rewriting it. Even now I'm not satisfied with it, but if I keep waffling I'm never going to get to the smut that was the whole point of this fic originally. I swear, next fic I write will have the smut upfront in the very first chapter so I can get it out of my system.

 **FishyFod** , thank you again for all the feedback! Yeah, there is no way that Luvia and Rin won't have that talk about the Fifth Holy Grail War at some point. It's just too much of a shadow on Rin's life, and reflects too much of what's wrong with magus society, not to come up in the future whenever these two stubborn ladies have a heart-to-heart. Or fistfight, you can never really tell with those two.

The concept of drawing infinite mana from infinite worlds always bothered me a bit too. I suppose you could make an argument about greater infinities, and that for all the worlds in which a climatic confrontation occured under Ryudou temple (i.e. Heaven's Feel), there are as many or more worlds where it didn't (i.e. Fate, UBW, or something entirely different), and thus the mana was up for grabs. But while maybe a master like Zelretch himself can be that selective when he draws mana, it's unlikely for an apprentice like Rin. Hence his warning to be careful with the Second Magic until she has some idea of what she's doing (which realistically may not be within her lifetime).

You've already correctly identified my canon sources. This fic is largely based on the F/SN Visual Novel, drawing from the other sources you mentioned for characterization and as a source of information about the Clocktower. Since there isn't as much as I would have liked, I also crib bits and pieces shamelessly from Fate Apocrypha. The Masters of Red are enough of an afterthought in that series that I can grab surface characteristics without worrying too much about maintaining details. Hence the Pentel family (with their twin masters) having a workshop large enough for two before it was commandeered by our favourite vampire.

In fairness to the fandom's portrayal of Zelretch, anyone who creates the Kaleidostick has a bit of a trollish streak. I agree it does tend to be overblown, though; I tend to see Zelretch as a tired man who is largely disillusioned with the world, but smiles when he finds some unexpected shoot of talent or hope that he can push along.

His appearances in canon are more by reference than anything else, truth be told – end of Heaven's Feel, Prisma/Ilya, and Fake/Strange. My image of him comes from his meeting with Arcueid from Plus Period. Certainly there are lots of valid interpretations though.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Dusk was rapidly falling as Rin stood on the curbside, nestling in her dark red coat in an effort to ward off the chill in the air. She checked her watch – 9:48 pm, a few minutes later than arranged, but not late enough for concern given the unpredictability of traffic. She was nevertheless relieved when a blue sedan, remarkable only for its mundanity, slowed to a stop in front of her. Remembering Mikael's rather terse instructions, she counted the flashes of its headlights – three, four – before she nodded in satisfaction. She opened the back door on the left side and slipped inside.

Even in the dim confines of the back seat of the vehicle, she could easily see the young man in the seat next to her, his pale features illuminated by a stray bit of moonlight. He looked very much like a younger version of Jacopo, jet-black hair and angular cheekbones, but without the scarring that had marred the other's face. He seemed to also lack some of his father's composure; his dark eyes swept over her with a hint of nervous energy that she couldn't imagine the Vendramin elder allowing to show.

"Marco Vendramin," she nodded towards him, a statement rather than a question, as the driver wordlessly pulled away from the curb.

"Ahh, yes. Miss Tohsaka, was it?" In spite of the dark interior, she could make out the restless tightening of his hands, clutched as they were in his lap.

"Of course." She looked at him questioningly. "Is something the matter?"

"Oh, no. Everything's fine. You're just... not quite what I expected."

"Insufficiently blonde?" she remarked dryly.

"Uh, no, considering the name and all, even if you're supposed to be a relation of the Edelfelts." He scratched his cheek awkwardly. "I thought you'd be some kind of ice queen with a big holster of guns or a glowing sword or something. But you just seem like a normal girl."

"I assure you, I'm fully capable of handling anything we run into." she said with a confidence that she didn't quite feel.

At least it seemed to put Marco a little more at ease. "Sorry, sorry," he said, raising his hands in a gesture of appeasement, "I didn't mean to question your abilities. You just don't really scream bodyguard, you know." He leaned back in his seat and sighed heavily. "The Durnovos favour the nasty and brutish. If we catch up to this guy, he won't go down without a fight."

"Obviously," she said a bit testily, "And that's assuming there's just one operative, which is unlikely." She quietly ran her fingers along the seams of her coat, feeling the gems secreted in their inner pockets for reassurance. "I'm surprised your family is sending their precious heir out on this kind of search-and-destroy mission. The report says they've probably been surveiling the villa for some time now. Given how valuable and easily recognized you are, they've got to be keeping an eye on you. They're probably preparing an ambush as we speak."

"I haven't been to the villa yet. I just got in this morning by train, under an assumed name. Father didn't want me in London until he had sorted out suitable allies." His expression took on a rather sour look before he shook his head. "Even if they are monitoring me, we'll just have to deal with it. I don't have a choice."

Rin frowned. "That doesn't make sense. You could always send someone else –"

"No, I can't," he said firmly, looking her straight in the eyes for the first time. "Father says if I want to join the rescue, I have to prove myself first. Show I have both the nerve and the talent to be the heir." He paused as the car rounded a particularly sharp corner, then looked down at the hands clenched awkwardly in his lap. "I have to make up for my mistake," he continued softly. "After all, it's my fault that they took Clémence."

"Your fiancée? What do you mean, your fault?"

Marco kept his eyes cast downwards as he spoke almost to himself. "You have to understand, she was a country girl. From a French family of little consequence, only three generations old. But she had a rare sorcerous trait that Father wanted for the family. With the Durnovos' familiars getting stronger against our traditional forms, he said it was time to try something new."

"What kind of – "

"Malleability," he cut in, his tone flat. "It makes her body especially suited to magical enhancements – Reinforcement to stronger limits, or Metamorphosis. Father wanted to see how it would interact with our element, if it could be enhanced into a delivery system to help cut through magic resistance."

"Father ordered that she be kept in our mansion grounds in Venice, where she would be hidden and safe. But our grounds are full of thick woods and shadows, even in daylight, because that's what makes us comfortable. But it didn't make Clémence comfortable. She was a country girl, and she missed the fields and sun and she was _wasting away_." He grit his teeth. "And I should have known better, I know that, but I wanted her to smile again. That smile when we first met, when she was still happy."

"So I snuck her out for a picnic on a hillside. I would be punished for it later, but it would be worth it." His tone took on a note of aggrieved desperation. "It was a public park, in broad daylight! And it was only for an hour. It should have been safe. But an hour was enough for that bastard Rogday." He took in a ragged breath. "I was an idiot, and she paid the price."

"Rogday Stanislav Durnovo. I remember, he was in the records your father sent over." As painful as the subject obviously was to Marco, she needed more details. Anything he could tell her about their enemies could be of help.

"Pride of place, no doubt, " he spat out. "I'm not going to get into all the history. Suffice to say he's an utter bastard. He must have called up a burrowing familiar of some kind. One moment we were on the blanket, enjoying the sunshine, the next the earth just fell out from under us. Like a sinkhole."

He shuddered, forcing himself to keep going. "I thought at first maybe it was just a small fault, but it was deep. So deep I had to scramble to grab traction, or I would have freefalled. And I could hear Clémence screaming out for me, something had her by the ankle and kept dragging her below. I summoned up my shadows and went after her."

"It was a trap, of course. I wasn't far down when something hard and spiky tried to grab my leg too. If I had hit it a moment later, I'd probably be down a leg." He looked even paler than before, his eyes closed as he recounted from painful memory. "And Rogday was down there too, chanting God-knows-what blasphemy."

"I had to retreat, I had no choice! It was all I could manage to escape them. I had to pour every ounce of prana from my circuits into my shadows. Even then, they were all shredded by the time I dragged myself out to the surface. It couldn't have been more than ten minutes before I assembled our retainers, but of course they were gone." He stared straight ahead for a long moment, before turning to Rin with an angry spark in his eye. "I won't abandon her a second time. I'm going to save her, no matter what."

"We don't even know if she's still alive," said Rin coldly, watching him wince. To her surprise, he rallied immediately, glaring at her fiercely as if defying her words and the fate they implied.

"I know she is. And I _will_ save her, no matter what."

* * *

As the streetlights gave way to the lawns and looming trees of Telegraph Hill's park, the car came to a stop and the two magi stepped out into the cool night air. Marco took a few steps onto the grass, still a bit wet from recent rain, before closing his eyes in concentration and whispering under his breath. A faint trace of blue light leaked from underneath the left side of his shirt collar, bathing his lower face in an eerie glow. Rin was not surprised when the air around them steadily began to feel heavier, the London lights a little less bright.

After a few moments, Marco turned to her, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead but looking satisfied. "I'm not as good at this as my father, but it should still give us a bit of breathing room."

A short climb to the top of a nearby ridge offered them a good view of the southern side of the Hill. With some Reinforcement on her eyes, she could make out the red-brown roof tiles and curved spires of he Vendramin villa. Although she was standing on grass instead of a concrete railing, searching for an enemy magus in this way couldn't help but remind her of another night, the start of another conflict. Although Marco seemed alright in his way, she missed the strong presence of Archer at her side. But she had failed him; her carelessness had forced him to throw himself in front of the Shadow, take the blow meant for her. Sorrow and guilt welled up, but she pushed them back down with a difficult swallow. He would not thank her if she repaid his sacrifice with weakness.

"Looks like there's quite a few buildings they could be using to get a good view of the villa." Marco's voice dragged her back to the present. "That's a pain. I guess we'll mark them on a map and visit them one by one? If they brought a familiar, we should be able to pick up at least some trace if we're close enough."

She followed his finger as he pointed out a number of high-rises towards the south, and shook her head. "That will take a long time on foot. I have something better." She reached into one of her pockets and felt around, bringing out a handful of gleaming amethysts. Holding them in both hands before her face, she whispered in German and blew lightly on them, before throwing them up into the air. They took the form of owls, their delicate facets shifting and realigning into violet wings and eyes, before scattering into the night breeze.

"Are those -" began Marco, but Rin held up a hand to silence him. The amethyst owls could search by themselves, but they were more effective if she guided them. Trying to see through multiple pairs of eyes at once was difficult even at the best of times, and she didn't need the distraction of a conversation.

Through their sight, the world shimmered in shades of icy blues and rich purples. The clarity was startling, enough that she could have counted the leaves of each tree, or admired the coarse grit of the sidewalk's mortar, had she so chosen. Instead, she let her consciousness inhabit them loosely, the impressions washing over her as they sped silently through the air.

Lost in the visions of flickering lights and moving cars below, she wasn't sure how much time had passed when a mental tug directed her attention to a wispy trail of soft light below. Traces of spiritual energy, she noted with satisfaction, and directed the owl downwards to follow the trail more closely as it wound over rooftops and along walls. It was very faint, often requiring her familiar to circle back and approach from several angles before picking it back up. The mental strain was beginning to manifest as an unpleasant itch in the back of her brain.

Just as she was wondering if she should take a short break to recover, the scattered patches of energy swiftly began to coalesce into a solid strand, before bursting into a flare of blinding white light. She instinctually pulled back her consciousness, reeling from the sympathetic pain. But there was still enough link to transmit the image of a pair of big pale orbs and snapping jaws full of crooked fangs before her connection was abruptly cut off.

Although her detachment had saved her from the worst of it, there was still a burst of mental feedback painful enough that she would have fallen to her knees if Marco hadn't caught her arm to steady her.

"Did you find them?" he asked anxiously.

"More like they found me. Expect company," she said through gritted teeth. He nodded and began mumbling under his breath as the shadows around them lengthened and solidified, forming what she took to be some kind of barrier. She forced mana through her limbs as she Reinforced them, feeling the bones and muscles strengthen. She reached into her pocket for a gem as she took a defensive stance back-to-back with Marco, scanning the area for threats.

They didn't wait long. There was a sharp whistle and a sudden pressure in the air above them. Both magi threw themselves to the side as a nightmarish beast came hurtling down, landing heavily on the ground in front of them.

Its reptilian face was dominated by oversized eyes like saucers filled with pale white fire. To Rin's horrified fascination, she could see small shards of amethyst glinting in its fanged mouth. Her eyes were drawn down its elongated quadrupedal body, covered in serrated scales, to the masses of sickly membrane stretched between legs that ended in powerful hooked claws. The aura of strained mana flowing from it, that feeling of the unreal forced into the physical world, readily identified it as a manifested familiar.

Rin shook herself out of it as the beast turned towards her, clicking its teeth in anticipation. A sudden lunge, a rush of air as the scaled mass came hurtling towards her. She dodged to the left, slinging a ruby towards it as it sped past. It hit the creature's rump and exploded on impact in a burst of smoke and fire. It shrieked angrily as it skidded to a stop, its clawed feet tearing up great tufts of sod underneath it, before whirling back towards her.

She felt her stomach drop as she saw that its scaly hide, though somewhat singed and blackened, had not suffered any serious damage despite the force of the blast. _Magic resistance,_ she thought bitterly to herself, the imparted essence of a dragon imbuing the thing with more than just armored plating. No wonder the Vendramin had been compelled to call for aid.

Her magic crest flared an icy blue as long spears of ice formed in the air above her, even as the beast lunged at her. A thrust of her arm sent the icy projectiles directly into its charge. Unable to pierce its scales, the sheer force of the collision still forced the beast off its feet. Thrown violently backwards, it slammed through several branches before landing heavily on its side.

Maddeningly, the thing made a low rumble in its throat – she would have sworn it was a chuckle if she didn't know better – before it heaved itself back up on its feet. She tensed, reaching for another gem, before shadowy tendrils suddenly burst from the ground under it, wrapping around its legs to hobble it in place. It gave a surprised hiss before rearing up with its full strength, furiously snapping its jaws to tear through the solidified shadows. Even as one tendril was shredded, another sprang from the darkness and replaced it.

Looking over her shoulder, Rin spotted Marco with his hand outstretched towards the familiar, thick shadows writhing around him before tapering out forward. Sweat poured down the side of his pale face as he kept pouring mana into the tendrils, tension suffocating his entire frame.

Rin was about to turn her attention back to the beast, to hit it square between the eyes with a well-aimed blast, when a bad feeling crept over her. Tackling the enemy was all well and good, but she had been primarily assigned to this mission as a bodyguard. Marco, shaking with strain and oblivious to his surroundings, was terribly vulnerable in this position. And wouldn't a familiar be accompanied by its master?

As soon as the thought formed, she sprang into action. Her legs, invigorated by magic, propelled her forward as she raced towards Marco and the figure emerging from the dark night behind him.

She caught a brief glimpse of a bearded man in a brown military-style coat before focusing on his fist, charged with an ominous red glow and raised threateningly behind the shadow mage. She had barely a second to act, but countless hours practicing her kenpo had honed her fighting instincts to a razor edge. Charging forward, she grabbed a fistful of his coat's collar with her left hand and his sleeve with her right, his surprise letting her under his guard. With trained precision, she stepped past him and swung her Reinforced leg down on his calf at the same time as she leaned heavily against him, flawlessly executing the _o-soto-gari_ and bringing him crashing down on his back.

Even as he fell, she felt his glowing hand graze her left side as he scrabbled for purchase. She was immediately assaulted with burning agony as she felt his fingers _melt_ through her clothes and into the flesh below. She choked back a scream and staggered back, desperately channeling mana to heal the worst of the wound.

Her opponent hauled himself heavily to his feet and spat on the ground before turning to face her. Watery brown eyes flicked up and down, briefly assessing her, before offering her a nod. "Careless of me," he rumbled, his words coloured by a guttural accent she couldn't quite place. "Well, since you managed to catch me off guard, I suppose I owe you an introduction. So you know who's sending you to hell tonight."

At a snap of his fingers, the scaled familiar bounded past her, having somehow dragged itself free of Marco's shadows. The man patted his thigh imperiously and the beast reluctantly crawled to his side, as if dragged by an invisible wire embedded in its head. It tensed as he reached down to condescendingly pat it between its bulging eyes, proudly showing off his control.

"Zurab Guruli, favoured hireling of the noble Rogday Durnovo, at your service," he said, bowing mockingly. "An opportunity to kill old Jacopo's successor should net me a nice bonus." He shrugged at Rin. "Wrong place, wrong time. Too bad for you, girl."

He lightly tapped the left breast of his coat before pointing at Rin with his index finger. The familiar shivered violently, then lunged towards her, slavering mouth open wide. She threw herself to the side, barely avoiding its crushing jaws even as the sudden movement caused her earlier injury to throb painfully. Somewhere behind her, she could hear Marco yelling as shadowy tendrils thrashed wildly in her peripheral vision.

She spun around as she thrust her hand in her pocket, drawing out the first gem without pausing to identify it. No time for hesitation; the beast was already approaching, its eyes glowing in the dimness as it stared at her hungrily. She flung the gem forward – it turned out to be a fiery gold topaz – before detonating it in the space between them. Sickles of cutting wind filled the air, causing the beast to wince and close its sensitive eyes.

Taking advantage of the delay, Rin drew heavily from her mana reserves, pushing aside the oncoming headache and dizziness that were the first warning signs of mana depletion. She raised her hand in the characteristic "finger-gun" of her favourite curse and took aim. Crackling red and black energy split the night as she unleashed a barrage of _Gandr_ shots at the stunned familiar, each slamming into its reptilian face with the force of a bullet.

A human would have been pulverized into a fine red mist from the assault. The beast suffered a series of small wounds, oozing black ichor where the curses hit its most vulnerable areas – the frothing lips, the membranes that served as its eyelids. It gave a shrill scream and skittered backwards – even if the bullets weren't doing serious damage, they still _hurt_.

To Rin's relief, it didn't immediately resume its attack, instead falling back and pacing side to side, considering her warily. She ignored the pounding in her head and braced herself in an aggressive posture, raising her finger threateningly. The beast followed the movement with its eyes and took a few steps back, growling low in its throat.

"What are you doing? Kill her!" Zurab's voice boomed from close by.

She risked a quick glance in his direction. He and Marco glared at each other from a distance of a few metres, panting hard, their arms raised in fighting stances. Shadowy tendrils still coiled behind the Vendramin heir, but there were notably fewer than before, their substance a little thinner. Of course – if she was starting to starve for mana, it would be far worse for Marco, with the constant pull on his reserves. The saving grace was that their foe seemed tired too, his limbs hanging heavy and his teeth sunk into his bottom lip to brace himself. The cost of both enhancing his fists and supplying his familiar would be significant.

Some of that weakness must have been transmitted to the familiar, which seemed reluctant to press the attack now that the prey was proving troublesome. It glanced at its master and growled plaintively.

This only seemed to irritate the man. "Go!" he snarled, reaching under the left side of his coat to place his hand on something. With her Reinforced eyes, Rin could vaguely make out the outline of a bulky rectangular object pushed against the cloth of an inside pocket.

A rectangular object about the size of a book.

Her blood ran cold she was immediately dragged back to a terrible memory from a War filled with horrors. In her mind's eye she could see Matou Shinji holding her sister hostage, the steel of his knife gleaming at her throat. Rider crouching on the floor, her crimson blood flowing from Archer's strike. And Shinji's arrogant smirk as he held a red book embossed with gold, a book engraved with the Command Spell that allowed him control over the spirit despite her bitter hatred of him.

 _Of course_. The jealousies and suspicions of the old families meant that the Durnovos likely had only a few members sufficiently trained in their binding arts to summon familiars of any real power. Their agents would receive only temporary control through a borrowed contract.

She clenched her fist as cold rage spread through her, pushing away her fear and fatigue in its icy burn. She had never wanted to relive that moment, or the blur of pain and anger and guilt that followed it, and here it had all been dredged up again.

"Marco, keep the familiar busy. I'll take care of this bastard."

She forced mana back into her limbs with Reinforcement, the adrenaline pushing away the dull ache in her body. With a wordless cry she charged forward, closing with Zurab in a flurry of vicious open-palmed strikes. He raised his arms in front of his face in a blocking motion, skidding backwards from the force of her blows, before counterattacking with a set of punches. She nimbly ducked under the first one, the red fist leaving a trail of dim light behind it, but he caught her a glancing blow across the forehead with the second. Painful, but hardly enough to take her out when her blood was running this hot.

Their combat turned into a flurry of brutal blows and rapid kicks, but Rin was being steadily forced backwards due to the need to avoid that deadly hand at all costs. She was outmatched, and she could see by his triumphant smirk that he knew it too. At least, she would have been if her intent had been to connect a punitive blow. Fortunately, he didn't seem to realize her real aim was quite different.

Mustering her strength, she brought her left hand down hard on his right forearm in an open-palmed strike, forcing the glowing hand downward even as she moved towards him. She raised her other arm as if she intended to strike him a blow to the head. He sneered in amusement as swept his hand upward, clearly intending to grab her attacking hand.

Instead of following through with the motion, at the last second Rin let her entire body drop. The hand that had been aiming at Zurab's hand instead roughly grabbed the left side of his coat, using the momentum of the fall to make the material rip down in a jagged vertical line. She managed to land crouched on both feet, still clutching a fistful of ripped cloth from which a weight dangled heavily.

Gripping the cloth tightly, she threw herself to the side, expecting a punishing blow to intercept her at any moment. A vicious kick, a savage blow, or another attack that she would be hard pressed to defend herself against in her vulnerable position. Instead, she heard a cry of alarm behind her as she remained blessedly untouched. She scrambled to her feet and spun around to face her foe.

Zurab was desperately patting down his damaged coat. Clearly not finding what he was looking for, he made a quick search of the ground before turning to her, his mouth opening soundlessly. Fingers trembling, she disentangled the book from the shredded remains of its pocket and held it silently in front of her.

She saw the terror flash in his eyes before he tensed, preparing to charge her. She never gave him the chance. " _Flamme_ ," she whispered, engulfing the book in fire and swiftly burning it to a cinder.

An instant later, there was a deafening screech and a blur of movement as the familiar leapt through the air, landing directly to her right. Rin tensed for a strike, revenge for cutting off its mana source. Instead it bounded past her and sprang upon Zurab.

The man fell backwards under its thrashing weight, desperately reaching up in an attempt to grab at its luminous eyes. It smoothly snapped its head out of reach, then reared up and threw its forelegs down in a way that drove each claw through one of his shoulders, pinning him to the ground in a welter of blood. Then it paused, looking almost thoughtful as the man thrashed underneath it, before burrowing its fangs deep in his belly.

Rin staggered backwards, unable to look away from the grisly sight, as the beast messily began to devour its former master. There was an uncanny _intent_ in the slow, careful way it tore at his flesh and dragged out his entrails, snapping them up between its jaws even as it held Zurab's agonized gaze with its own. His screaming swiftly gave way to strangled gasps, and finally to a low gurgle as his throat filled with blood.

"I think I'm going to be sick." She turned to see Marco walking unsteadily towards her, his horrified eyes still fixed on the ravenous beast.

"It lost its connection to him, so it's using another way to get at his mana," said Rin, unable to fully keep the tremor out of her voice. "We don't have much time before it finishes and looks for other sources."

"Sources like us."

"Yeah." She ran a hand through her disheveled hair, willing herself to concentrate against the sounds of snapping bones and eager swallows. "Those scales seem pretty blast-resistant, but the same probably can't be said for its guts. Too bad it's already learned how dangerous my gems are."

A particularly loud tearing sound, accompanied by a satisfied growl, made them both flinch. A glance at the familiar showed that it had torn off Zurab's head and was busy wolfing it down as a whole piece. Very little remained of his limbs or torso.

She took a deep breath to steady herself. "How much power do you have left? Can you still call your shadows?"

"Not much," he admitted with a shake of his head, "Pretty much drained dry. Maybe a few arms if I really push it."

"That'll have to do. It looks like it's almost done." Rin strode to a nearby ornamental fence and grabbed one of the line posts. With a grunt and a shriek of bending metal, she tore it free and hefted it, testing its weight. Lighter and flimsier than she would have preferred, but beggars couldn't be choosers.

She gripped the post firmly with both hands as she began to pour magical energy into it. Reinforcement of objects was not her specialty; as much as it pained her to admit it, Shirou had had an unmatched affinity with such material transmutation spells. But the pole was structurally simple to understand, and buttressing its durability was entirely suited to its fundamental purpose as a "thing that should bear weight".

She returned to Marco and put the post down before reaching into her coat to extract a large ruby. Holding it in her palm, she closed her eyes and murmured, " _Zerbrochene zeit, flammen ausbruc,"_ then blew softly on the gem. It began to glow with a dim red light.

She handed to her fellow magus, who caught it gingerly. "I've set a delay on the detonation. We have five minutes to get it inside that thing's mouth."

"What are you going to do with that?" he asked as she bent down to retrieve the post.

"Hopefully make you an opening."

She walked purposefully towards where the familiar was finishing up its meal, its chin dripping with blood and stray bits of shredded muscle. The harsh iron smell almost made her gag.

"Hey, ugly!" she called out.

The beast raised its head to look at her, and then slowly and deliberately licked the gore from its chops. It abandoned the remains of its former master to move towards her in a wide circle on light, almost playful steps. It put Rin in the mind of house-cat that had just gorged on one mouse, and wanted to make the next one last so as not to end the hunt too quickly.

If the familiar seemed set on taking its time, Rin knew hers was running out. How to get it to charge? After a moment's thought, she smiled tauntingly at it and raised her right hand to point at the beast with the distinctive _Gandr_ finger-gun.

It came to an immediately halt, snarling viciously as it locked eyes with her, glowing white saucers meeting sharp aquamarine. She braced herself as it crouched low, poised to pounce.

It sprang at her. At the same time, she raised the post and wedged the reinforced metal against the roof of its mouth, causing it to break the momentum of the charge in its surprise. Its claws scrambled for purchase in the dirt as it rocked back on its haunches.

Then, to her horror, it almost casually shifted its jaws to snatch the post between its teeth before biting down hard, tearing through the reinforced metal like so much cardboard. It theatrically spat out the largest piece at her feet, then made a low gurgling noise that vibrated along the back of its throat. This time, the sound was unmistakable; it was laughing at her.

 _It's sentient_? Not entirely surprising for a strong familiar, especially one infused with draconic essence. She didn't have time to ponder the matter any further when it moved towards her again, resuming the playful gait from before. It opened its mouth wide in a clear threat display, showing off the bits of shards, bones and painted metal stuck between its cruel fangs.

That was its mistake.

The shadowy tendril shot over her shoulder, ramming the glowing ruby deep inside the familiar's exposed gullet. The beast immediately disengaged and reeled backwards, constricting its throat in a desperate but futile attempt to throw up the stone.

Moments later, there was a muffled roar from inside. Its scaly hide _bulged_ horribly in all directions from the internal impact. The large pale eyeballs ruptured, spewing forth gouts of noxious black ichor. Its legs collapsed out from under it and it fell heavily to the ground, its devastated head lolling at an unnatural angle.

Rin's shoulders heaved as she panted hard, keeping her eyes trained on the smoking remains despite the pounding building in her head. Thousands of aches and pains commanded her attention, but she couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong. Shouldn't the body be disappearing…?

She heard Marco's wobbly footsteps as he came to stand beside her. He looked bruised and bone-tired, but otherwise uninjured. "Thank god," he muttered, before breaking out into a shaky laugh. "What say we let someone else do the cleanup –"

With a strangled roar, the familiar dug its claws into the ground and awkwardly heaved itself to its feet. It slowly swept its ruined eyes, still dripping black fluid, back and forth as though it could find its tormentors through sheer force of will.

"Oh come on," she groaned. This was beginning to be an expensive night, but it was worth it to expend another gem to put it down for good.

She was just reaching into her pocket for one when a whistling sound cut through the night air. A flash of silver in the darkness, and something full of sharp points, dragging a shining cable behind it, embedded itself in the familiar's head. Metallic and shaped somewhere between a clawed gauntlet and a bear's gaping jaws, its prongs shot down and hooked themselves deep into the tattered remains of its eyes. The familiar screeched, shaking its head violently as it drew up a forepaw to dislodge the weapon. The more it flailed, the more tightly the hooks sunk in.

There was a stomach-churning suction noise, like someone slurping through a straw to get the very last bit of liquid in a can. Seconds later, Rin could see the beast's black blood start to pool in the hollow glass of the bear's sculpted eyes, before flowing out the back to run up the cable. Her eyes were drawn irresistibly to follow its length back to the figure emerging from between the trees.

Mikael Edelfelt met her eyes and grinned at her, raising his left arm to show the metallic bracer on his right arm from which the cable emerged. The black blood flowed steadily into the bracer, then visibly swelled his veins as it was absorbed into his body.

Then with a loud grunt and a jerk of his arm, the cable rapidly retracted; it tightened and caught for a moment, then there was a loud rip and the beast's head came flying after it, spinning obscenely in the air. The prongs unclenched and the head sailed over to crash somewhere in the foliage behind them, while the weapon was dragged back to reattach to the bracer, retracting and coiling its cable along the way. Already, the corpse was beginning to fade from existence; without the familiar's will, there was nothing to keep its composite mana from dispersing.

Rin tensed as Mikael walked towards them, his eyes alight with a feral glint. While he was supposed to be her ally, the savage display had put her nerves on edge. "Mikael," she nodded brusquely.

"Rin. Marco. Good work tonight." He nodded back, still grinning. He paused as he caught Rin's stiff expression, and his smile became sheepish. "Ahh, sorry about stealing your kill there. I wanted her to have at least a little taste of blood tonight," he said, patting his bracer fondly. "Let's keep this our little secret from Luvia."

Marco blinked at him, then glanced over at Rin for guidance. When she maintained her stony silence, he turned nervously back to Mikael. "That's, uh, that's okay. Always happy to see the cavalry arrive."

"You've been watching this entire time, haven't you?" said Rin, with an accusatory frown.

"You're still new to this, you know? Luvia wasn't about to risk our client's precious successor by sending only a newbie with him. So she asked me to tag along and step in if necessary."

Rin felt her hackles rise at his condescending tone; even if she was new to the family business, as it were, she was still a veteran of one of the deadliest conflicts known to magi. "If I'm such a newbie, why didn't she send you instead?"

"Trial by fire is the Edelfelt way. It's also a bonus that to guys like that, you look like a soft target." Mikael brushed past both her and Marco, walking towards the patch of bloodied earth where Zurab had met his gruesome end.

"Soft target?" she repeated angrily, falling in alongside. Marco trailed a few paces behind, looking warily between them. "So you wanted them to attack us!"

"We knew from the interrogation that they had at least one agent in the area, probably more. But the clever bastards kept moving around, and they covered their tracks pretty well. We found bits of trail, but never enough for a definite pinpoint. We needed them to come to us."

He looked over his shoulder at Marco, who flinched back under the fierce gaze. Mikael barked a laugh, then continued. "Jacopo's heir makes a pretty tempting prize, don't you think? And he just couldn't bring himself to think of a teenage girl as a real threat, even when a magus is trained to know better." His smirk widened, and Rin had the distinct feeling he was thinking of another girl as well, a certain mutual relation.

She was about to demand to know why he hadn't stepped in sooner, given the multiple times she had come perilously close to being eviscerated, when Mikael abruptly stopped above what little was left of the enemy magus. He bent down and began searching through the bloodied scraps of clothes, humming cheerfully to himself.

"Ah-ha!" Mikael grinned as he triumphantly held up a torn wallet, his fingers slick with red. He quickly flipped it open and glanced through the various cards before eagerly drawing out what looked like an electronic key card for a hotel. "Excuse me. I need to call in so they can send an extraction team to pick up the rest of the scum. Before they get a chance to escape." He pulled out his cell phone and dialed before starting to bark orders in rapid Finnish.

Rin left him to it, the ache in her head and limbs drowning out the words of a language she had only recently learned. She looked back at Marco, who was staring fixedly at the remains with his fists clenched tightly to his sides. Approaching him, she could hear him murmur something repeatedly under his breath. When she made out the name "Clémence", she came to a halt, unsure of what she should do next. Neither the cold demeanour of the professional magus, nor the practiced but superficial charm of the school idol, seemed the least bit appropriate. For a brief moment she wished Shirou were here, foolish optimism and all; he would have known what to say. She sighed and stuffed her hands into her pockets, looking up at the moon and wondering what he and Sakura were doing right now.

Mikael snapped his phone closed and stretched himself. "That about does it. A cleaning crew will be along shortly." He looked over at Marco. "Anything else you want to do before I call our ride?"

"No," said the Vendramin heir, in a colder voice than Rin had yet heard from him. "We've done what we came here for, and I have a report to deliver. Take me back."

* * *

Rin spent most of the ride back in silence, once again seated in the back across from Marco. Both magi were exhausted and lost in thought, thinking about loved ones far away. Mikael sensed that they did not share his jovial mood and instead took the front passenger seat, where he spent the time chatting amiably with the driver.

Rin did not recognize the area of town when the car began to pull into narrower residential streets,and was frankly too tired to care. She looked over at Marco and frowned when she saw the tension in his face, the haunted look that was more familiar than she cared to admit.

She hesitated, then quietly reached over and tugged his sleeve. He looked at her in surprise. "I can't promise anything. She might be beyond our power to save. But as long as there's a chance, we'll do our best to save her," she said softly, so much that her voice barely carried to him over the raucous laughter from the front.

He stared back at her for a long moment, then swallowed hard and nodded. "Thank you," so faint it might have been a whisper. Then he opened the door, swung himself out and disappeared into the night.

Rin settled into her seat, intent on brooding the rest of the way back to the dormitories. She was both surprised and irritated when Mikael took the opportunity to get out of the car and claim the back seat so recently vacated by Marco. As soon as the door closed, the car resumed its journey, leaving her trapped with him.

They rode in silence for a few minutes, then Mikael turned and smiled at her. "I meant what I said back there, that was good work. You've got more guts than Luvia gave you credit for."

"What's that supposed to mean?" she said, her eyes narrowing.

"She said you might get cold feet if things came down to killing. Hesitate too much, or stubbornly insist on something non-lethal. I thought that might be the case too, when you started grappling with the guy." He shook his head, before smiling and giving her a conspiratorial wink. "But I have to admit, you know your business. Nice touch, getting his own familiar to tear him limb from limb." He laughed merrily. "Hard to think of a more painful way to go."

Rin thought about protesting that she hadn't meant to kill Zurab, just incapacitate him. But that wasn't true, was it? She had seen full well that his familiar hated him, was likely to turn on him with deadly force the instant she broke his hold on it. It was just that at that moment, filled with rage and fear, she hadn't cared.

She knew she should feel bad about that, feel at least some guilt over taking a human life, even an enemy's. Instead, she just felt numb.

Mikael chattered on, unaware or uncaring of Rin's distant stare. "We'll get the info we need out of his cronies at the hotel, once our boys have had a chance to work them over. Speaking of which," he said happily, as his phone began to vibrate.

The rest of the ride back passed in a bit of a blur, her headache compounded by Mikael's clipped orders and the flash of streetlights passing overhead. Eventually the gates of the Norwich Student Dormitories came into view, and she sighed in relief. She was looking forward to bed and a few hours of blissful oblivion.

Just as she was thinking this, Mikael put away his phone and turned to her again. "Get Emmi to patch you up and don't worry about the report, I'll take care of it," he said amiably. "Looks like you'll be joining us on our Russian expedition after all."

Rin gave him a surly look and opened her mouth to say something, she wasn't sure what, when he suddenly leaned forward, his feral eyes boring into hers. "And just so we're clear – if you even think about betraying us, I'll kill you slow. I'll make what happened to Zurab today seem like a picnic compared to what I'll do to you."

Before she could respond, he beamed at her and clapped her on the shoulder. "Looking forward to working with you, cousin" he said, before letting himself out of the vehicle. The worst part, Rin thought as she watched him walk towards the gate, frozen in her own seat, was that he probably meant it.


	7. Chapter 7

_Mists swirled around her as Rin picked her way through the Einzbern forest, the surrounding trees dim outlines in the fading twilight. It was quiet and bitterly cold, much colder than she had remembered it being from the War; her breath clouded in the air._

 _She didn't want to be here, in this place of old battles and bad memories. There was nothing here for her, or really for anyone, anymore; the trees would welcome neither beast nor bird, and the castle would sit silent, waiting for a mistress that would never return. Still her feet carried her forward, over a trail covered in fallen leaves and tangled roots. It felt as if she were answering some unnameable call, something that bypassed her ears entirely and spoke directly to the darkest recesses of her mind._

 _After some walking, she wasn't sure how long, the trees began to thin out. A break in the canopy allowed a thin beam of moonlight through, illuminating the forest grounds ahead with a pale silvery light. She felt a certain amount of dread when the vegetation parted and she found herself entering a familiar clearing in the woods. The site of –_

– the corrupted Saber, clad in black armor and gripping an Excalibur, no longer sheathed in invisible air, that pulsed with the malevolent black magic of Morgana –

– Berserker, facing down a threat that even through his madness he knows he cannot defeat, in a desperate bid to buy his mistress time –

– Archer heaving from a lethal wound, impaled by the Shadow in her stead –

– _one of the fiercest battles of the Fifth Holy Grail War. She almost expected to see all the servants there re-enacting that disastrous night, a movie reel of horrors._

 _To her relief, the clearing was silent as she pushed aside a sapling's branches and walked into open space. But while she remembered it as little more than a gap in the trees, it was now overrun with odd pillars, their silhouettes stark against the white of the moon. They looked almost like... crosses?_

 _The figures gave her an ominous feeling, like they intended her harm, but she found herself walking mechanically towards them all the same. Even as the earth and grass gave way to something wet and cold that squelched under her feet as she passed, she still couldn't tear her eyes away as the shapes came into focus._

 _Jagged shadows of red and black, twisted into a mockery of the cross of her family's traditional faith, each covered in an array of cruel spikes. And on each shadowed cross, impaled on those spikes, hung a human body. She swallowed back a scream as she looked around – the clearing was full of bodies, mostly young men but also women, even a few children. She distantly recognized some of them from the streets of Fuyuki, more and more of them as she unwillingly found herself moving deeper into their midst._

 _The viscous chill bit at her feet, and she looked down to see that she was standing in a shallow pool of black ichor, steadily bubbling up from the ground. She winced in disgust, trying to shake it off her shoe, but it clung with surprising resilience. She automatically reached out to steady herself, then snatched her hand away at the last minute before it rested on the sinister-looking surface of a cross, a deep black criss-crossed with disturbing red pulses. She looked up, her eyes drawn as if by a force beyond her control, and found herself looking back into the vacant eyes of a dead Mitsuzuri._

 _This time Rin did scream, or at least tried to, but no sound came from her mouth as she scrambled back from the corpse of her friend, still dressed in the Homuhara uniform, her arms hanging limp like a doll's. Her back hit something solid and she spun around, only to be confronted by Matou Shinji, his arrogant smirk gone forever from his ravaged face, his eye sockets dripping black blood. A little further she could see Archer, the impaling tendril still lodged in his chest, blood running down and intermingling with the red of his mantle. The massive body of Berserker, arranged on no less than three intertwined crosses to hold his weight. And beyond that, the pale figure of a young girl, spikes driven through the purple fabric of her coat…_

" _It is your fault." The voice came from the above and behind her, a whisper in the dark night, but a hauntingly familiar one. A voice that she had not heard in more than a decade, that had encouraged her and patiently guided her magical talent. A voice that had promised her and her mother that it would be the victor, and shower the family in glory, before leaving for a war it would never return from. Hearing the voice of her father in this field of nightmares, a voice that should have filled her with love and longing, instead filled her with dread._

 _She slowly turned to see a vague form rising from the ichor, a towering black column of black liquid shaped roughly like a serpent's head. But where she would have expected empty shadows, or orbs of pale white, there were instead contemplative eyes of aquamarine, so similar to her own._

" _This is the price of your weakness, of your failure. If you had upheld your duty as Second Owner, they would have lived. Instead you let her live, and her darkness took them. Their deaths are on your head."_

" _I… I meant to! But I couldn't, not while there was still a chance with the Grail…" Her voice sounded weak even to her own ears._

" _And you continue to disappoint. You are the heir of the Tohsaka bloodline, an Average One of rare ability, properly bred and raised in all respects. You should be striving for the Root with all the pride and elegance of our clan. Instead, what do I see? My own daughter, betraying our ancestors, licking our enemies' boots, making a mockery of Nagato's legacy."_

 _Rin flinched. Painful as it was to hear it, it was true. "I had no choice. I had to protect Sakura."_

" _Do not lie to us both. She loves you enough that she would have fought for you if you had asked her to. You could have saved our clan's honour."_

" _No!"_

" _You thought about it."_

" _... yes," she muttered, her cheeks red with shame, before she managed to rally. "But I chose otherwise! I won't sacrifice Sakura anymore, or let her do it to herself."_

 _A deep sigh, that seemed to reverberate in the darkness around them. "You are a profound disappointment. All the potential in the world, wasted because your heart and spirit are weak. And for all your debasement, you won't even save any of them."_

 _The shadowy head tilted to one side, drawing Rin's eyes along the movement. More crosses, and on them more impaled bodies; Rider, her dishevelled lavender hair trailing in the black ichor; Shirou, slumped forward, all four limbs roughly ripped off and the grotesque stumps oozing blood; worst of all, her little sister, a black tendril squirming obscenely from the corpse's mouth while the sightless eyes stared back at her._

" _No! I won't let this happen."_

" _Everything you touch will turn to failure, everyone you love to dust. And you will have no one to blame for it for yourself, for rejecting the destiny that could have been yours."_

 _As Rin turned back to face the shadow, fist clenched defiantly despite the violent tremor in her limbs, the head sinuously moved to the right, just far enough to offer her a glimpse of another dark cross behind it. The head was hanging down limply, the once blonde ringlets stained with black blood, but it was unmistakably Luvia._

 _With a wordless cry of rage and grief, Rin lunged at the thing wearing her father's eyes, even as it opened black jaws and rushed down to meet her -_

– then sat up suddenly in the darkness of her room, covered in a cold sweat.

Dazed, her mind still half in the nightmare, Rin awkwardly slipped from her bed and groped blindly in search of water for her parched throat. No glass on the nightstand – in her exhaustion, had she accidentally left it on the vanity?

Guided by the thin sliver of streetlight from her window, she could just make out the vanity. She stumbled over to it and began her search, fumbling in her haze with brushes and bottles, before something caught her attention and she glanced up. In the dark, all that stood out clearly were two aquamarine eyes gazing back at her. Eyes just like the serpent's, like her father's.

Before she could even think, instinct took over. Her fist smashed into the mirror with enough force to shatter the shadowed glass, and oh how her hand _burned_ –

* * *

Luvia was sound asleep when the sound of shattering glass pierced the night, but as expected of a magus of her breeding, she awoke clear-headed. She put on her robe and quickly snatched up a few charged citrines from her nightstand. As she went to open her door, it was flung open and she found herself facing a panting Emmi.

"It came from Miss Rin's room," said the maid, looking anxiously down the hallway. "I wanted to check up on her, but you always say not to barge into a magus' room…"

"You did well," said Luvia, giving her a reassuring smile despite the rapid pace of her own heart, "I will see to it myself."

Holding a gem tucked in her hand, she paused before Rin's door, but could hear nothing more. She placed a hand on the door and waited while the locks slid themselves open, before steeling herself and walking in.

In the light spilling from the hallway, she could see the black-haired girl sitting on the bed, eyes closed and shoulders hunched up, panting hard. Silvered glass from the vanity mirror was scattered across the floor along with drops of blood, still fresh and deep red.

"Rin?" she called out, taking a few careful steps forward.

"I forgot, you know," muttered the other girl, more to herself than to Luvia, "they always did say I had his eyes." Rin gave a shaky laugh before taking a deep breath and turning to face Luvia, forcibly settling her face into her usual mask of composure. "I'm fine, it was just a nightmare. I apologize for the disturbance. I'll clean it up in the morning."

Luvia looked down at Rin's bloodied hand, glinting with embedded glass shards, and frowned. "Just a nightmare," she said dryly, before crossing the room and sitting down next to the other girl. Ignoring Rin's protests, Luvia took her hand and slowly began picking out the bigger shards. The rest would come out automatically with use of healing magic.

"You don't have to do that," said Rin, looking off to one side, her cheeks lightly flushed. "I'm not weak. I can take care of it myself."

"This is not weakness," corrected Luvia with a patient sigh as she held wrapped her fingers around the girl's hand, gently channeling mana as torn skin and muscles knitted themselves back together. "Trauma is common among veterans and field agents alike. I apologize for not realizing sooner."

"You… you apologize?" Rin looked at her like she'd grown a second head.

Luvia swallowed her annoyance at the girl's incredulous reaction. She was perfectly capable of apologizing provided that she was in the wrong, which admittedly meant it happened rarely. "Not for sending you out on the mission. That is the family business, to which we are all bound," she said, a little harshly, before letting her voice soften. "But you project confidence so well that I overlooked the risk of triggering further distress. I should have checked up on you afterwards, and for that oversight I am sorry."

"Hmph, I told you that I'm fine," grouched the other magus. "But… thanks. For the hand, I mean."

It was adorable that Rin refused to meet Luvia's eyes, as if contemplating the ceiling would somehow hide the blush on her cheeks. As unwise as it was, the blonde magus couldn't resist poking the tigress a little. "My pleasure. And rest assured that I will not fail to provide appropriate aftercare next time."

"Af – aftercare? You don't mean –"

"You do not seem the type to appreciate therapy, but exercise is also supposed to be beneficial. Mikael was impressed with your hand-to-hand combat skills. Perhaps you would be open to sparring with me? Or," and she smiled wickedly, "perhaps you would prefer a different kind of exercise…?"

Rage and embarrassment warred on Rin's face as she stood up, glaring down at Luvia with a furious scowl. "The training room is fine. I'll wipe that smug smile off your face."

"In the middle of the night?" said Luvia, arching her eyebrow even as she inwardly smiled in satisfaction. Whatever terrorizing visions had gripped her charge earlier, they were swiftly dissipating to make room for anger. It was a much better look on her.

"You offered, I'm taking you up on it. You never specified when. Come on princess, this shouldn't last more than a round or two."

As it turned out, it lasted several hours and ended in a draw. The combatants were equally matched in fighting prowess and stubbornness alike, unwilling to concede defeat in any round without immediately calling for a rematch. But when she slipped into bed afterwards, falling into her first deep sleep in weeks despite her bruises and wounded pride, Rin had to admit that perhaps there had been some merit to the idea.

* * *

Two weeks later found Rin sitting by herself in their shared workshop, busily consolidating her research into a workable set of revised notes. Luvia was absent for the moment, dragged along by Zelretch for a practical demonstration of recent lessons.

Rin didn't envy her, not after the same lesson had almost overwhelmed her in coloured blurs of tangled visions and patterns that she understood to be overlapping realities, each distinct and yet simultaneously as enmeshed as the hues of a rainbow on a misty day. Even now, after some time to rest and process what she'd experienced, trying to call any of the details to mind resulted in a confused blur of impressions and a pounding headache. The vampire had assured her that her retention would improve with repeated exposure, but part of Rin whispered that clarity would worsen rather than ameliorate the strain on her sanity. She could only hope that she would master his teachings before she lost her mind completely.

She was pulled from that rather grim line of thinking when the workshop door opened to reveal a fuming and thoroughly bedraggled Luvia, dripping water from head to toe. A thousand possible taunts bubbled up in Rin's brain, which she managed to swallow back only when she remembered the blonde's restraint the other day, when Rin herself had returned in a similar condition. Instead, she contented herself with a small shake of her head as she said, "I warned you, didn't I? Even if you know it's coming, it's still hard to dodge it."

"A most unnecessary end to an already trying lesson," said Luvia angrily, her soaked shoes squeaking with every step as she stalked towards her desk. "But if he thinks such small trials are enough to break my will, he has never been more mistaken in all his centuries."

Rin watched as the blonde reached into her desk for a handful of red spinels, tapping into their energy to dry herself. Unfortunately, while the dress smoothed out readily enough, her thick blonde tresses were an entirely different story. Taming that hair into Luvia's characteristic drills was tricky even for an old hand like Emmi, let alone an agitated heiress without so much as a mirror to help her. The same thought seemed to have occurred to Luvia, as she settled herself with a sigh and pulled out her brush and make-up compact, determined to make the best of things.

Rin decided to take pity on her. "Here, let me," she said, crossing over and gently pulling the brush from the blonde's hand. "We can't let the family head go around looking like a drowned rat. What would the nobility say?"

Luvia looked annoyed for a moment, before her lips curled into a smirk. "And yet you insist you aren't my servant. Or is this your way of begging for an allowance?"

"Shut up before I change my mind and burn it off instead," huffed Rin, more out of habit than anything else as she reached out and began to tidy the ringlets. It was hard to stay angry while handling that glorious sun-blonde hair, silky and wonderful to the touch even when disarranged. As she leaned over to gently smooth out the golden bangs, Rin let herself breath in the scent of roses and citrus tea that still clung to the other girl despite her recent misadventure. She would have felt embarrassed if Luvia wasn't clearly enjoying this too, closing her eyes and relaxing her shoulders with a contented sigh.

As she continued her admittedly pleasant task, Rin reflected that she had been spending an inordinate amount of time with Luvia recently. Academic overlap and a shared workshop meant they had already spent considerable hours together each day, but now the blonde also insisted on regular sparring matches and training sessions. And with her formal addition to the Durnovo strike team, she increasingly found herself staying up late at night, sometimes with both Luvia and Mikael and sometimes with her family head alone, pouring over various plans and strategies.

After effectively living alone for more than a decade, Rin had expected that the constant company would swiftly grate on her nerves. But to her surprise, she found herself enjoying the blonde's presence, her quick wit and her warm smiles. Even if it came at the price of an occasional volley of condescending remarks, sarcastic barbs, or on particularly bad days, a short burst of fisticuffs.

Rin wondered if this is what it would have been like having a sister, if she and Sakura had been allowed to grow up together. Admittedly, it was difficult to imagine her gentle and long-suffering sister indulging in the kind of petty snubs and teasing antics that the blonde seemed so fond of.

And more importantly, she had never found her heart start to beat just a little faster when Sakura entered the room, or secretly wanting to run her hand through silky hair and along warm skin, or craving to be touched in return. All things she impossibly, mortifyingly, maddeningly, had begun to associate with Luviagelita Edelfelt.

Rin had always had a healthy appreciation for beautiful women, but until now she had never questioned her sexuality. She had been sure that her fondness for a certain red-headed boy, however deeply buried, settled the matter. To imagine that she would feel unambiguous, unabashed physical attraction towards another girl –

 _\- But it's not the first time, is it?_ her mind whispered treacherously. _You thought Saber was really attractive too._

Alright, yes, the thought had momentarily crossed her mind when she saw the shining King of Knights, with her fine features and noble bearing. Apparently Rin had a thing for dangerous blonde foreigners. But she had swiftly dismissed it as an impossible dream in the face of their status as enemies in the War.

And as with Saber, this current fancy – Rin refused to consider it anything more serious – was impossible for the simple reason that it would never be returned. Luvia teasingly flirted with her because she found it an easy way to get under her skin, but it would be foolish to expect it to go anywhere. The Edelfelt head had already declared her intention to marry a young man from one of the respectable magus dynasties, and she would expect Rin to do the same.

 _You shouldn't want it to go anywhere!_ she reprimanded herself as she tugged out a particularly stubborn tangle in the blonde curls. _Remember about her being the enemy? You shouldn't want to touch her, even if she does have a perfect set of legs_ – goddammit, bad thoughts again –

"You have that look in your eye again. Should I be worried, Tohsaka Rin?"

She didn't need to look down to know that the blonde was smirking again. "No more than usual. If I wanted to knife you in the back, I would have done it weeks ago."

"Using the ritual dagger that Mikael obtained for you, no doubt." She tilted her chin up even as she sighed. "If you needed additional equipment, why did you not come to me?" If Rin didn't know better, she would have sworn the blonde sounded a little hurt.

"It just seemed like the kind of thing he would know how to get," she soothed, "And I figured that since we're going to be working together, I should try to reach some kind of rapport with him." Rin had honestly been a little surprised at how willing, eager even, Mikael had been to provide her with a literal dagger after all his warnings about backstabbing.

"Rapport, hmm? Should I consider him as a candidate for your hand?"

Rin snorted. "I think the only bride Mikael is interested in is his Mystic Code, the way he keeps petting it."

Luvia laughed, and Rin couldn't help but giggle along with her. "You will need to make allowances," the blonde observed eventually. "The _Karhun pää_ is known to have a certain influence over its wielders."

"Like making them literally crave blood?"

"Unfortunately yes, among other things. Mikael controls it comparatively well, believe it or not."

"I hope I'm not expected to find that reassuring."

"Hah." Luvia hummed approvingly as Rin carefully gathered up her hair and tied it up in blue ribbons. "But I meant to ask, what do you intend to do with that dagger?"

"Special project," said Rin.

"Ah yes. The infamous project that keeps you in the workshop for hours on end," said Luvia, betraying a hint of irritation. "I certainly hope it is worth all the sleep you are losing over it."

"I hope so too," murmured Rin as she stepped back to admire her work, her fingers still tingling from the touch even as her heart laid heavy with regret. Well, even if this particular goal was forever out of reach, she had the other one to focus on. Even if it was a long way from completion, and it seemed like an impossible task without her partners from the War, she would get done what she could in the time remaining to her.

* * *

Luvia smiled as she scanned the latest field report from Helsinki. As expected from a clan based in an old port city like St. Petersburg, the Durnovos were in the habit of smuggling more exotic arms and components by ship board. How unfortunate for them that the Edelfelts' power base was directly across the Gulf of Finland, and that infiltration and confiscation was among her family's mercenary specialties. She could certainly find better uses for the seized grimoires and charms than whatever their enemies had planned for them.

The net was closing in on the Durnovos, and it was almost time to snap it shut. Soon she would leave for Russia to spearhead the assault. She felt a rush of fierce anticipation at the thought that this, finally, was the moment of truth; of whether she had led the House of Edelfelt to glory or ruin.

She looked up at the sound of shuffling paper, and saw Rin sorting through the letters piled on the table. Although both girls generally prided themselves on their organizational skills, it was inevitable that some documents would stray when strategy sessions took a turn for the heated.

"That's funny," muttered Rin, "I thought I saw Marco's… hmm, what's this?" She cleared off the stack and picked up an opened and somewhat battered-looking envelope. "Handwritten, and addressed to you by first name."

Luvia glanced over, then cursed under her breath as she recognized the most recent letter from her father. She could not believe her own carelessness in leaving it out rather than hiding it away in her deepest drawer. As tired and preoccupied as she had been of late, there was no excuse for such sloppiness.

Drawing herself up to her full height, she reached out her hand imperiously. "Give it here," she demanded.

"A love letter, perhaps?" smirked Rin as she slowly and deliberately looked it over. There was an odd glint in her eye that Luvia could not immediately make sense of. "How very scandalous."

"It is from my father, if you must know," said Luvia frigidly.

That immediately wiped the smile from Rin's face. "Ah," she said with an awkward glance at the blonde, "Sorry about that." Luvia extended her hand more firmly, and the black-haired girl sheepishly gave her the envelope.

Luvia struggled not to show her embarrassment as she tucked the letter away in her sleeve for safe-keeping, but she was unable to keep a slight flush from colouring her cheeks. She braced herself for some snide remark or other, but Rin seemed equally uncomfortable as she hurriedly buried herself into some other piece of correspondence.

 _Of course_ , she realized upon reflection, _she was an orphan._ It was to be expected that these matters might be difficult for her as well. Luvia returned to the report, but to her frustration she found that she was having difficulty concentrating on the words. Instead, she found her gaze wandering across to the other magus, waiting for Rin to say something, or at least look at her.

Growing inexplicably irritated when no reaction seemed forthcoming, Luvia raised her chin and fixed the girl with a defiant glare. "I expect that someone in Turku told you the whole sordid story."

"It came up, yes," said Rin with an apologetic shrug.

"As head of the Edelfelt clan, it is my duty to keep an eye on all members of our family. Even the cowards and deserters."

Rin nodded, but said nothing more.

They worked in silence for some time, while Luvia tried to ignore the nagging feeling of resentment that had been steadily growing in her since the letter had been uncovered. When she realized she had just read the same paragraph for the third time, she gave up and sat upright with a frustrated sigh.

"Do you think my father was wrong?" the words slipped out before she could stop them. Her cheeks turned a little redder, but she refused to look away from as Rin met her gaze.

"Are you sure you want my opinion?"

"I asked for it, did I not?" she said, raising her head in a haughty manner.

"Fine, just don't get mad when you decide you don't like it." Rin sighed and rubbed her eyes, taking a moment to collect her thoughts before facing the blonde. "I think that he was wrong to throw all that responsibility on you without talking to you about it first. Even if he knew that you were up to the task of leading the family, he still placed his needs and wants before yours. That was undeniably selfish, and unfair to you. But I think I can understand where he was coming from."

Luvia glared at her and took a deep breath, but said nothing.

Rin watched her warily for a moment, before shrugging. "He remembered that he's a human as well as a magus, and he chose to follow those feelings. That's probably also why he writes to you, because he misses you and he feels guilty." She raised her hands defensively when Luvia frowned at her. "Not that it's an excuse or anything, and it's not like you have to forgive him. But at least he thinks about you, even outside of you being his heir." The Japanese magus laughed ruefully. "I can't imagine my father making that separation."

"What was your father like?" Another question that just slipped out, and one she didn't really expect the other girl to answer.

But to her surprise, after a moment of hesitation, Rin did. "He was a very proper magus," she said slowly, as her gaze drifted through old memories. "He very much believed in pride, and elegance, and duty. He would have been a better fit for the Edelfelt family, actually, but then he would never have accepted that 'arrangement' we reached."

Ah, apparently Rin still held a bit of a grudge over the manner of her induction into the family. Luvia would have to spare some thought as to how best to soothe over that lingering resentment.

For the moment, she watched the black-haired girl waved vaguely at the pile of letters. "My father would never have willingly abdicated his position as head of the Tohsaka family. But then, he would never have allowed himself to form an attachment with a commoner either. Because it wouldn't advance the Tohsaka magecraft."

Rin closed her eyes and took a deep breath, forcing herself to continue in the face of painful memories. "Magecraft was his paramount concern. That's why he overruled my mother and gave Sakura away despite the Matous' foul reputation. So she would reach her potential as a magus."

"You don't seem to have liked your father much," observed Luvia.

"On the contrary," said Rin with a sad smile. She reached for a large round crystal, currently pressed into service as a paperweight, and placed it gently on the table in front of her. A whisper of fingers brushing the faceted surface, an infusion of mana, and the crystal took the form of a rearing horse, sparkling in the light. It looked exactly like the kind of thing that would appeal to a little girl.

Rin lightly stroked it before letting it collapse back into its original form. "He was my entire world. I loved him, I respected him. I wanted to _be_ him. And when he died in the Fourth War, I swore I would carry on his legacy and make him proud. I would fulfill my duties, as a magus and as a Tohsaka." She drew in a sharp breath. "That's why I spent so much of the War trying to kill Sakura. Then Emiya, too, when he wouldn't stop trying to protect her. It was obviously the right thing to do, the thing all my training said I should do."

"It… it didn't work out that way. I couldn't kill her. Not when she was still wearing my ribbon after all those years. And… and not after all she'd suffered, and all I wanted her to have in life if there was the slightest chance of it."

The girl was silent for a long moment, the look in her eyes positively haunted. It was clear that something terrible had happened in the War, something that she had omitted from her official report and still couldn't bear to talk about. Luvia's natural curiousity urged her to push for answers, but she stifled it with some effort.

Eventually, Rin seemed to remember that she wasn't alone in the room. There was a hint of anger in those aquamarine eyes as she locked them fiercely with Luvia's. "And then I went and caved to my ancestral enemies, gave up all the Tohsaka pride and legacy in the name of something as soft as protecting my sister."

"So I guess I'm like your father. I'm a lousy magus who lets my feelings get in the way of my duty. And what's worse, I can't bring myself to regret it." Then, with something like a smirk, "And now you've gone and formally absorbed me into the Edelfelt clan, despite knowing what I was. So I guess you're a lousy magus too."

"You have a lot of nerve saying that to your family head," said Luvia.

"Maybe, but I bet it's not the first time you've heard it."

"No. But it _is_ the first time that it was meant as a compliment."

To their mutual surprise, they both burst into laughter. The clear notes were a welcome relief, a return to normality after that tumult of emotions. Rin rose from her seat, but before she headed for the door, she lightly took hold of Luvia's hand.

"Thanks for listening. I'm so used to bottling everything up that I forgot how much of a relief it can be to just tell someone." She sighed as she ran her other hand through her hair. "Emiya wouldn't begin to understand, and I can't really discuss my feelings about father with Sakura, not after what he did to her."

Luvia curled her hand around the other girl's in response, enjoying the warmth of her touch before forcing herself to let go. It would be unseemly to keep the girl from her well-earned rest, no matter how much she wanted to keep her here a little longer.

Once she had the room to herself again, Luvia hesitantly pulled her father's letter out and gently smoothed it out on the table, trying to sort out her feelings. She was still angry with her father, but she was starting to understand about wanting things that she knew she shouldn't.

She began to reach for a pen and stationary before sternly stopping herself. She didn't have the mental real estate for this now. She could reconsider after the assault on the Durnovo stronghold.

After all, if she had miscalculated, then the whole matter would be moot.

* * *

 **Author's note** : I know Ayako survived her encounter with Rider, but I figure dream-logic and guilt don't always fully reflect reality so much as state of mind.

 **sen** : Thank you as always for the comment. It's always nice to know someone's reading, especially after you post up a new chapter and the radio silence makes you wonder if you've somehow managed to lose the story thread entirely and everyone's just being too polite to tell you as much.

 **Omaomae** : Glad that you're enjoying! As you said, there isn't much in canon about what happens to Rin following the Heaven's Feel route. It's certainly possible that I'm overemphasizing her shift towards her more humane side, but I like it better this way too.

You're also quite right that Rin happily makes Archer wait on her, but it always struck me as a follow-up to making him clean the living room after his faulty entrance and his snark; a way of trying to remind a mouthy Servant of his place, albeit with limited success. Also the fact that he's a version of Emiya Shirou, and all Shirous just naturally seem to inspire people to start treating them as domestic help. I thought Rin might react differently if the person waiting on her was a normal human girl, and one primarily beholden to her rival at that.

Hah, I know what you mean about trying to find a suitable ship for Rin. Archer seems the most popular among the fans, but for all his natural charisma, the poor man just seems too _damaged_ for anything like a relationship. If I convince you that Luvia is a suitable option, then I'll wear that as a badge of pride! Although now you've gone and tempted me to try shipping her with Ilya just for the sheer inappropriateness of the whole thing.

Mikael... definitely is not entirely right in the head. But his heart's in the right place! And he'd love to put the Durnovos' hearts in the right place too, if they'd only let him. He's even got the ornamental jars picked out and everything.

 **DschingisKhan** : Thank you for the comment. I think Rin and Luvia's bickering is a bit more bearable when they're challenging each other for their own sakes rather than squabbling over a boy who seems more oblivious than anything else (canon relationship be damned). Glad to hear it's not rubbing you too much the wrong way, and please do let me know if I fall off the tightrope.

And don't worry, Rin will have plenty of opportunity to shine in upcoming chapters. One thing that I have to keep reminding myself of is that for all their power, modern magi and their artifices are nowhere near the power of the Heroic Spirits summoned by the Grail. It can be a bit tricky to remember to scale down after all the epic fights we enjoyed in the VNs.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Luvia sat at the table, drumming her fingers on the leather-bound dossiers in front of her. Normally a model of aristocratic patience and grace, she was finding it difficult to keep still now that the night of battle was swiftly approaching. She could already feel the blood of her warrior ancestors pump a little quicker in her veins, bringing with it agitation but also a pleasant sort of excitement. Not for nothing had her family frequently been compared to the forest wolves of their homeland.

Now if only Rin would finally deign to answer her summons. Luvia had sent Emmi to fetch her over twenty minutes ago, and she knew for a fact that the other magus had neither class nor tutorial scheduled at this time. She was beginning to wonder if she should do the unthinkable and go looking herself when there was knock at the door, and the Japanese magus entered the room.

"Emmi said you wanted to see me?"

Luvia leaned forward in her seat, resting her chin on her hands as she considered the other girl. "For some time now. It is poor form to make others wait on you, especially your family head."

Rin didn't look the least bit apologetic as she crossed the room to join her. As she approached, Luvia's finely-tuned senses picked up a faint but definite scent, something sweet and savoury with just a hint of spice. "I came as soon as I could. It's hardly my fault it took Emmi a while to think of checking the kitchens."

When the blonde just stared at her, Rin sighed with a hint of exasperation. "Don't look at me like that," she said, misinterpreting the look, "I'm not trying to steal the cook's job or anything. I just miss proper _gongbao jiding_ ; most of the restaurants let the chicken simmer too long, so the taste of the chilis ends up overwhelming the peanuts."

"You cook?" asked Luvia with a raised eyebrow, trying to slot this new piece of information into her mental picture of Tohsaka Rin.

"Not in a while, since I came to London," she said with a shrug. "But I find cooking something familiar helps settle me when I've got a lot on my mind. Something about keeping the hands busy."

Luvia could appreciate that; as much as she prided herself on her razor sharp mind, there was a certain sense of satisfaction that came from creating something with one's hands. She could easily see the appeal of cooking and baking, having tried several times in the past with the amused help of the more indulgent cooks.

Of course, that had only been tolerated in her younger years; as she grew older, she had been firmly and repeatedly rebuked that it was beneath the Edelfelt heir to engage in such menial tasks. With the delicious fragrance still in the air, she couldn't help but wonder how far she might have gotten if things had been different. She briefly found herself envying Rin the freedom with which she had grown up, before remembering with a wince that said freedom had come at the cost of the girl's entire family.

Well, at least she could have the next best thing. "I see. We'll need to give you a chance to show off those culinary skills one of these evenings." She smirked in response to the startled look Rin gave her. "Unless you're afraid of falling short?"

"I'm more than up to the challenge," said Rin, "It's just… you'd want me to?" She kept her voice level, obviously trying for nonchalant, but there was the slightest touch of red in her cheeks.

Suddenly what had seemed like a simple request took on a more intimate undertone. "Of course," said Luvia, adopting a lofty tone in an effort to ignore the feeling of encroaching butterflies in her stomach, "As head, it is my obligation to personally evaluate all of our family members' skills."

"If you say so," said Rin agreeably, but that smile was just a little too knowing for Luvia's taste.

Eager for a change of subject, she cleared her throat and slid one of the dossiers across the table to her. "In any event, I called you here to inform you that we are leaving for Helsinki in two days. Here are your new passport and biography; memorize them at least enough to answer superficial questions you may be asked along the way."

Rin accepted the dossier, placing it at her side before turning to Luvia with a solemn expression. "We're really doing this, then."

"Having second thoughts?"

"No, I'm definitely coming." Judging from the way her hands unconsciously clenched into fists on the table, Luvia guessed she was thinking about Marco's abducted fiancée. Then Rin frowned before adding, "I should warn you though. If the Durnovos are anything like the Matous, then be prepared to see some pretty gruesome things in their inner sanctum."

Luvia straightened herself up. "I am the head of the Edelfelt clan. I am hardly a fragile flower." Even if hearing about the dead bodies found in Zurab's rented apartments had been admittedly upsetting. Still, feeding victims to familiars to provide additional power was not unheard of, if thankfully uncommon among modern magi. With her extensive training, she wouldn't lose her nerve over just that.

"I don't just mean violence. I mean… well, twisted things. Vile things. Especially since Clémence's sorcerous trait is Malleability."

Rin looked intently at her, as if willing her to understand what she meant so that she wouldn't have to voice it.

Much as Luvia would have liked to indulge her and leave it at that, a warning this vague hardly gave her anything useful. "You will need to be clearer," she said.

Rin visibly turned tense and rather pale, her gaze shadowed and her lips set in a grim line, and for a moment Luvia feared that the other girl had fallen ill. Then she took a deep breath and steeled herself.

"Do you know anything about Crest Worms?"

When Luvia shook her head, Rin continued, "The Matou family uses a unique sort of Magic Crest, if you can call it that. It is made up of parasitic worms that merge with the host's nerves and circuits." Rin spoke in the clipped, detached tone of the professional magus, but Luvia could easily hear the tremor beneath it, how close her voice was to breaking. "The Matou don't teach magic by training the mind. They use the Crest Worms to impress it on the body."

"That's absurd," said Luvia uneasily, confronted with the revolting image of magic circuits made up of crawling parasites. "It would be unbearably painful."

"The host is further trained…" Rin looked like she was about to vomit, before she swallowed hard and continued, "further trained through exposure to Matou Zouken's worm familiars. Worms that devour human energy."

 _I can't really discuss my feelings about father with Sakura, not after what he did to her_. Some very unpleasant pieces were beginning to click into place. "Wouldn't that kill the host?" Luvia asked softly.

"Supposedly so, if the host is male. But if the host is female, they instead violate… " Rin trailed off as a shudder overcame her, her hands clutching at the edge of the table.

Luvia hesitated in the face of the implied atrocity, before reaching over and gently but firmly grabbing Rin by the shoulders. She pivoted the other girl to face her. "Rin, tell me what happened in Fuyuki. All of it."

"It doesn't matter," said Rin with a shake of the head, "It's in the past. We have enough to focus on right now." She tried to yank herself back, but Luvia had been expecting it and tightened her grip to keep her in place.

"I need to know what threats the Durnovos might have in store for us. Anything you can tell me about their Makiri cousins could be useful." Then she added gently, "and you need to drain this poison from your soul. It's eating away at you."

Rin stared at her for a long moment, as if searching for something in Luvia's eyes, before giving a reluctant nod. Satisfied that she wasn't going to pull away again, the blonde sat back as Rin folded her hands in front of her and gave a deep sigh.

"I guess to explain things," she said a bit shakily, "I need to go back to the Third Holy Grail War. Are you familiar with the name Angra Mainyu?

* * *

More than once over the next hour, Luvia regretted opening what seemed like an endless Pandora's box of horrors. Each new bit of Rin's story was more dreadful and stomach-churning than the last, as it became clear that the fifth appearance of the Grail had not been so much a war as a disaster. One that had come perilously close to ending in calamity.

Rin began tentatively at first, as if the subject of the War was sharp glass and even venturing near it meant cutting herself. But soon enough the dam had burst, and the other girl's pained voice almost stumbled over itself as she let everything out. The Einzbern's attempt to cheat the Grail system by summoning an aberrant class of servant. The absorption of its tainted nature into the Grail, transforming the prize into a poisoned chalice of lies and corruption.

With clear reluctance, she turned to Matou Zouken's obsession with extending his unholy life at any cost. His willful corruption of her innocent sister into the Black Grail through years of constant torture, violations, humiliations; allowing her to develop hope through her attachment to Emiya, only to then use it as a tool to break her will. Rin wrung her hands as she spoke of her own willful blindness to Sakura's suffering, her refusal to defy her family's pact and do something even as she saw the way the Matou magic was tainting her. _Did you know she used to have black hair and blue eyes, like me?_

The emergence of the Shadow, the manifestation of the dark god growing within the Grail, and its terrible hunger for servants and human souls alike. Matou Shinji, who should have protected Sakura but instead joined in on her abuse, commanding her own servant to help take her hostage in a jealous attempt on Emiya's life. Learning from the false priest that not only had Sakura been repeatedly violated and tortured, but that the Crest Worms could not be removed without killing her.

With a hard glint in her eye, Rin recounted her terrible conviction to kill her sister. What choice did she have, when letting her live would let the Shadow grow and consume all of Fuyuki? She had a duty as Second Owner. Surely even Emiya would understand. But Emiya refused to understand; he had fallen hard for Sakura, and he would not sacrifice her.

The terrible nights that followed; the desperate bid to reach an agreement with Illyasviel von Einzbern, which had ended in disaster. The loss of Saber and Berserker to the Shadow, and their reappearance as nightmarish, twisted versions of themselves. Losing her Archer and agreeing to having his arm transplanted onto Emiya, despite knowing how dangerous it was, how it risked consuming his body and mind entirely. Hah, it shouldn't even have been possible to graft a stranger's arm on Emiya's body like that, but what about the damned War had made any sense?

Then finally, Rin recounted the terrifying slide towards the birth of Angra Mainyu as Sakura gave up hope and spun out of control. Her own frantic work with Emiya and Ilya to recreate the Jewelled Blade of Zelretch, the treasure of the Tohsaka clan, as the only weapon that could stand up to the terrible power that Sakura could call from the Greater Grail. And the desperate fight under the Ryudou temple, where Rin found that at the last minute, even with everything riding on her, she could not bring herself to kill her sister.

It ultimately worked out, yes, but… what if? What if? Rin still had nightmares about what might have happened if Sakura hadn't had such inner reserves of strength, if Rider had been unwilling to ally with her master's erstwhile enemies, if Emiya hadn't been able to trace Rule Breaker. If All the World's Evils had been born.

Luvia had stopped interjecting early on, and could only stare at Rin in shocked horror as she continued her dreadful account. She could see the mental scars all over the girl, from the way she occasionally touched her Magic Crest with a haunted look, to her brow increasingly heavy with guilt and regret.

But she could also see Rin's strength, how she bore that terrible weight and yet moved forward with determination and dignity.

Rin sat quietly for a moment, her redden eyes downcast as if contemplating the wood of the table, before looking across at the blonde with uncharacteristic hesitation. "I can understand if you want me to leave, after hearing all that – "

As a magus of proper breeding, Luvia had had impressed upon her from an early age the importance of cautious consideration, of thinking through consequences before taking action. Throwing all that aside in favour of impulse, she rose from her seat and enveloped Rin in a hug. She felt the girl stiffen, then tentatively return the embrace.

"I'm proud of you," said Luvia, backing away just far enough to look Rin in the eyes. "Yes, you made mistakes, but none of us are perfect. Not even myself," she said with a smile, earning herself a shaky laugh from the other girl. "And together, you all managed to stop an apocalypse by the skin of your teeth. Give yourself a little credit, hmm?"

Rin briefly passed a hand over her eyes to wipe away the tears that had begun to form, then gave the blonde a grateful smile. "Maybe you're right." They stayed together like that for a long moment, neither wanting to be the first to break away, before Rin's embarrassment won out and she gently extracted herself to resume her seat.

"I'm, ah, still not entirely clear on where you want Mikael and I positioned after we breach the north wall. Could we go over the battle plan again?"

The Japanese magus had resumed her mask of confidence, appearing once again to be all business, but Luvia had grown close enough to her to notice the nervous tapping of her fingers on the table, the subtle pleading in those brilliant aquamarine eyes.

 _Don't leave me alone_.

"Of course," she said smoothly, pulling the well-worn plans and sidling over next to the other girl. "We must be sure that you understand the plan down to the last detail. There will be no room for error once the strike begins."

Focusing on the upcoming conflict, and challenges that she could _do_ something about rather than regret at leisure, seemed to do wonders for Rin's state. Fairly soon there was true confidence in her voice again as she verified various aspects of the strategy, pleased with her own contributions. Enough that she failed to notice the troubled look on Luvia's face, or the gears that were swiftly turning in the blonde magus' mind.

* * *

From her vantage point between the boughs of a silvery birch tree, Luvia focused the binoculars and observed the Durnovo manor raised on the hill in the distance. It was half-hidden behind iron gates and thick woods, but she could still appreciate the fine example of Petrine Baroque architecture, the contrasting red-brick and white stone and high flat windows. But while the house was beautiful, it felt solitary and somehow rather sinister; or perhaps that was just because she knew what lurked inside and, more importantly, beneath.

Her lips curled upward in a hunter's grin, revealing a flash of white teeth that held just a hint of cruelty in the fading sunlight. The journey here had been too long for her taste and irredeemably dull , from the drab cargo jet that they had taken to Helsinki (a necessary obfuscation, but not one that she cared to repeat anytime soon), on shipboard to Vyborg along the gulf, and finally down the forested coastline towards the northern edge of St. Petersburg. But it had all been worth it to stand here on the eve of battle, to lead the decisive assault that would recover her family's stolen treasure.

Seeing little activity – no doubt the bulk of her prey were lying in wait in the extensive passageways reported to have been excavated beneath the estate – she put aside the binoculars and walked down towards the makeshift camp, where the largest part of the combined Edelfelt and Vendramin forces had assembled. The earlier rush of activity had ebbed into a quiet but keen tension, as the retainers assembled into their teams and performed last-minute verifications of their equipment.

She couldn't immediately see Jacopo, but she knew he would be moving somewhere along the ranks, giving final instructions to the grim dark-garbed mercenaries he had brought with him from Italy. No matter, he had already agreed to the small revision to the plan that she had put to him earlier in the day. Now she just had to track down the two magi concerned.

Luvia eventually spotted Rin and Marco standing together by the vehicles, discussing something in low voices. She pushed aside an irrational flicker of irritation at the sight – _do they really need to stand quite so close together?_ – and strode confidently towards them.

"There has been an unexpected wrinkle that I need the two of you to take care of," she said with forced nonchalance as she approached.

"What's going on?" Rin said with a frown.

"We received word just now that a summoning ritual is being conducted in Irinovka, about an hour's drive away. According to our intelligence, it is being overseen by none other than Rogday Durnovo himself." Marco's countenance noticeably darkened at the news. _Good_ , she thought to herself, _he at least should be easily convinced_.

"As it appears that the lion's share of the Durnovos' forces are still holed up in the manor, we will still need most of our manpower here. This situation is best approached by means of a small infiltration team led by capable magi. Since the two of you performed adequately on your last joint mission," she paused and regarded them with just enough skepticism to seem natural, "consider yourselves volunteered. Nylund will fill you in on the details."

"Wait, are you sure about this intelligence? It seems too convenient that we're learning this only at the eleventh hour." Rin looked set to argue.

"This is an order," Luvia snapped, turning abruptly away. That was hardly going to satisfy the Japanese magus, but with any luck, stoking her irritation would distract her from that train of thought.

As Luvia walked back towards the main grounds, she saw Mikael standing a little distance away. He was savouring a cigarette, watching the curling smoke with the relaxed, contented air of a hunting beast waiting for night. He looked around at the sound of her footsteps, then nodded to her as she approached.

"Are you sure about this?" he asked, "she's definitely an asset in a fight."

Luvia nodded curtly. "Yes. Jacopo wants his heir out of the line of fire so that even if this operation fails, his line will not be entirely obliterated. Even if we are sending him away from the front line, he still needs to be accompanied by a competent bodyguard."

"That hardly justifies losing one of our hardest hitters from an assault this risky." He took a long drag from his cigarette. "What are you really up to?"

She sighed impatiently. "Keep being so sharp and you are sure to cut yourself." She tilted her head upwards to contemplate the darkening sky, steadfastly ignoring the look she knew Mikael was giving her.

How could she explain to him that after hearing Rin's horrific account of the War, she wanted to do her utmost to protect the girl from further horrors? If the Durnovos had anything similar to the Matou's Crest Worms… It wasn't that she thought that Rin was too fragile. It was more that it had hurt seeing her like that, the pain and guilt written all over her face. She never wanted to see that expression on Rin again, much less be the cause of it.

She heard a heavy sigh behind her, and the rustling of cloth. "The two of you really are too much alike. Here, let me give you this." She turned as Mikael closed the distance and placed something in her hands, an object about the length of her forearm, tightly wrapped in red cloth. "Rin told me to give this to you once it was too late for you to refuse it."

Luvia curiously turned the object over in her hands. It was fairly heavy, and felt hard as rock under its fabric covering. As she examined it, she found a small piece of yellow paper carefully tucked into the wrapping. Extracting it with nimble fingers, she unfolded it and read the Japanese script.

 _This one is even further from completion, so it could seriously harm your magic circuits. Use it carelessly and I'll kill you._

Her mouth was dry as she carefully removed the cloth, revealing a shining blade made of solid crystal. Ten brilliant gems glittered in the hilt, reflecting all the myriad colours of the rainbow. "The Jeweled Blade of Zelretch," she whispered to herself as she watched the way the light played across the dagger's surface. The Tohsaka's coveted family treasure, a tool that allowed its wielder to use the Second Magic to draw mana from infinite worlds. And Rin had given it to her, the head of the Edelfelt clan, their most bitter rivals.

She looked on in wonder for a moment, then used some of the red wrappings to strap it firmly to her hip. Despite its cold surface, the dagger made her feel warm, as it Rin were here with her after all.

"Mikael, send out the signal, " she said, her head raised high as she glared at the Durnovo manor in the distance. "Now we face our fate, whatever that turns out to be."

* * *

The world glimmered in shades of purple and blue, giving an otherworldy cast even to something as mundane as the backseat of a car. Of course the scene looked rather odd anyway from her unusual perspective on the floor, peering out from under the vinyl and metal of the bottom of the driver's seat. From here, her targets were mostly giant boots and disembodied voices, but that was ideal for her purposes.

"It's a pity we're missing the action," said a female voice that she distantly recognized as belonging to one of Nylund's subordinates, although it sounded somewhat distorted as it filtered down to her.

"Protecting the client is imperative," someone nearby – perhaps the front passenger seat? – replied. "I don't enjoy babysitting any more than you do. But imagine we turned around to join in, and the young idiot managed to get himself shot or something. Would you want to be the one to tell Miss Luvia?"

The first voice grumbled, but she didn't pay any heed. She had heard enough.

Rin cut her connection to the amethyst owl she had secreted in the back of Nylund's car, her natural senses coming back to her as her consciousness returned to her body. The feel of the leather seat under her, the steady vibration of the moving vehicle, the faint scent of gun oil in the air… she blinked her eyes open, once, twice, then heaved herself up. "I knew it," she snarled, before cursing angrily and colourfully in Japanese.

"Rin?" asked Marco, looking at her in alarm from the other back passenger seat.

"She lied to me," said Rin indignantly. "She _lied_ to me!"

Turning to meet the shadow magus' confused stare, she threw up her hands in aggravation. "There is no side ritual," she explained. "This is a wild goose chase meant to keep us away from the battle. To keep us safe."

"That can't happen," said Marco firmly, clenching his fists against his upper thighs. "I swore that I would save Clémence. She's waiting for me, and I won't let her down."

Rin tapped on the side of the driver's seat and leaned forward. "Turn this car around," she said in clipped Finnish. "We are going to the Durnovo house."

"I can't –" protested the man.

"That is an order," she said coldly, with all the ice of a northern winter. The driver hesitated, but complied after she fixed him with her fiercest glare.

 _You idiot_ , thought Rin as she looked out the window at terrain that wasn't passing by nearly fast enough. _Don't you dare die on me or I'll never forgive you._

* * *

Author's notes:

 **DschingisKhan** : And there's the spill about the Fifth War, in all its traumatizing glory. I'm not sure I got the appropriate balance between glancing over it so that readers aren't faced with too much repetition of things they already know, while still having enough detail to put across just how over-the-top horrible Heaven's Feel can be. Hopefully it was still fun to read.

And Zelretch is pleased that somebody caught on so quickly to his plans! After so many universes where these two are at each other's throats, can you blame him for giving them a little nudge towards other possibilities?

 **omaomae** : That's an interesting insight about the male gaze that permeates most of the works in the Nasuverse; you've put your thumb on something I've often felt, but never been able to put words to. It makes me wonder what Fate Prototype, with Ayaka as the protagonist, would have been like if it had ever been finished.

Rin is always fun to write; all the contradictions in her personality somehow work together to form a really interesting gestalt. Adding in good ol' Luvia only makes it all that much better.

As always, thank you for the delightful reviews!

 **sen** : Thank you for following along and for the comments. I'm glad you're still enjoying the fic despite the way I keep dragging my heels on new chapters. Fortunately the end is slowly creeping into sight!


	9. Chapter 9

One of the first skills taught to young magi of the Edelfelt line was Reinforcement magic, channeling mana to enhance the properties of an object or, for the more advanced practitioner, their own body. Strengthened muscles and augmented reflexes offered many advantages for anyone that wrested their living from the battlefield.

At the moment, surrounded by the raucous cacophony of an angry mob of crows, she was grateful for the enhanced eyesight that allowed her to see past the blur of countless black wings. As soon as her forces had crossed the northern side of the Bounded Field that surrounded the Durnovo manor, they had immediately been swarmed by large flocks of birds. They appeared from darkened spaces between the trees, from black patches of shadows on the grounds, even from the Edelfelts' own shadows trailing behind them. All of them had gone on the attack, circling low before dive-bombing their targets in a flurry of wingbeats and sharp beaks.

Fortunately they weren't much of a threat, easily dispersed with well-aimed blasts of flame and cutting winds. In the corner of her vision, she could see the silver cable of Mikael's _Karhu pää_ sweeping through the flock. It cut the crows neatly in half as it passed, their bisected bodies falling to the ground in a gruesome patter. _So far, so good_ , she thought to herself, allowing herself a small smile as they made their way towards the manor. She could do this.

While the crows looked like ordinary birds, Luvia recognized them as low-level familiars tied to the Bounded Field of the manor, programmed to manifest and attack as soon as the area was breached. Most likely they were bound by contracts permanently engraved in the manor's walls and surrounding statuary, drawing power from the local leyline so that they were constantly on guard.

A flash of golden light from her fingers, and blades of pressurized air mowed down the birds in front of her, allowing her a brief opening through the squawking mass. Although the crow familiars were individually weak, they could become dangerous distractions in a confrontation against the Durnovos' stronger minions. And they would continually reform as long as the Bounded Field remained intact, no matter how many they cut down. It was yet another reason to disable the field as soon as possible.

Reinforced eyes let her easily spot the magic sigils that maintained the field, etched on various stoneworks along the manor grounds. She grinned as she briefly thought of the half dozen she had already removed. From the waning strength of the field and distant screaming, she surmised that Jacopo's forces were having similar success in their attack on the southern side.

"There!" Mikael pointed up towards a round window mounted near the top of the manor's northern facade, barely visible in the pale moonlight. Looking up, Luvia saw the faint but tell-tale purplish glow of an activated sigil, placed above the window's framework to blend in with the carvings.

Reinforced muscles and a regular athletic regime made it easy for her to scale the wall, using its decorative ledges and mouldings to vault her way up until she was perched along the sill. She placed her fingers along the curved lines of the sigil, chanting softly as she drained its power until it faded and broke apart.

Luvia grunted with satisfaction, then moved to the edge of the sill, ready to drop down to the ground below. Just as she was about to push off from the brickwork, an ear-piercing shriek tore through the night. Then a rush of air as something came hurtling down at her.

Her body reacted faster than her mind, instincts honed by years of harsh training. An agile shift to the side, a blocking arm to repel the black talons snapping where her face had been only moments before. She had a brief glimpse of baleful yellow eyes in a scaly face before the creature glided away on leathery wings.

Some sort of avian familiar, enhanced with draconic essence, but Luvia had no time to ponder the matter. She had only seconds before it would wheel around for another strike. Cursing her awkward position on the ledge, she f her hand into the characteristic _Gandr_ gun and waited with baited breath.

She did not wait long. Another harsh cry, and the beast folded its wings to fall upon her, wicked claws first. Deadly for an ordinary human, but she was anything but ordinary. Luvia released the supercharged curse and nailed the familiar squarely in the chest.

The force knocked it back, leaving it to beat its wings frantically to find purchase in the air. It had only begun to right itself when a clawed gauntlet clamped on its left wing. One with a bear's head design, trailing shining silver behind it. A scream of bestial pain, and the beast was violently dragged down. It landed with a resounding thud below.

The blonde slipped off the ledge and dropped the two stories down to the ground below. Mikael already had his gauntlet firmly clamped around the creature's head. Blood flooded the silver claws impaled deeply in its eyes, then flowed along the cable to pool in the bracket on the man's arm. It was then absorbed into his veins, the stolen vitality strengthening his body even as it drew out his bloodlust. Already his eager smile was taking on a manic edge, grinning white even in the dim light.

As unsettling as the sight was, it was also reassuring. Monstrous as her cousin might be when he entered the bear's frenzy, he was _her_ monster. To be unleashed upon her enemies and smash every obstacle in her way.

Speaking of which. "You were supposed to cover me," she said, even as she unleashed a blast of fire to incinerate another winged menace.

Mikael nodded towards the ground a little distance away. For the first time she noticed the corpse of a man, still oozing gore from the hole punched messily in his torso. A throwing dagger laid close to the lifeless fingers, the blade glistening an ominous green.

"And so I did," he smirked.

The sight should have been disturbing, and probably would be once this battle was over, and the reality of death hit her fully. But right now her blood was singing in her veins, the thrill of the fray coursing through her. And hadn't she just reflected that Mikael was her monster? She could hardly complain about his savagery when he was employing it at her behest.

Ignoring the violent blasts and unearthly roars that erupted behind her as her retainers clashed with the enemy, Luvia strode towards the north wall of the manor. She reached into a hidden pocket and extracted a small cylindrical object. It was a minor Mystic Code, a device of burnished metal and clinging pincers around the central gem that served as its core.

A well-aimed throw, and the pincers had embedded themselves in the wall, bring the pulsing core directly against its brickwork surface. A muttered incantation, and the cylinder began to vibrate violently. Brick, wood and steel alike bent and crumbled around it, ripping open an improvised door. Not enough to fully avoid the manor's wards and traps, but at least she could avoid going directly through the front door, where the strongest defenses were likely to have been set up.

As the dust settled, she glanced through the opening and saw a patterned carpet, elegant chairs and tables. The drawing room, as expected from the maps that Jacopo's agents had smuggled out to them. She nodded to Mikael, and he stepped through first, eyes bright and weapon at the ready.

Moments later he was forced violently backwards, arms raised protectively in front of his face. Massive fangs were locked onto his bracer, attached to some hellish beast. As large as a bear, it seemed like an unholy patchwork of parts belonging from across the animal kingdom, all spiralled horns and fanned fins and gouging claws. And the inevitable plated scales and unnatural eyes that seemed to mark all familiars touched by Gorynych's power.

Mikael did not seem to least bit perturbed, even as he was compelled to grab the jaws, prying them apart before they could fully close and tear his arm off. If anything, his grin grew wider as he met its furious gaze. "Finally! Some blood worth drinking."

His muscles constricted with a power far beyond human as he forcibly turned the beast's head aside, then caught it a ringing blow with his fists. Soon they were locked in fierce combat, but Luvia did not have the luxury to stay and assist. Where there was a familiar, there was sure to be a master holding its leash.

She blew lightly on a brown agate and hurled it through the opening, forming a wall of earth to cover her entrance. Her caution had been well-merited; her barrier was immediately hit by a barrage of ice lances. Flattening herself along her cover, Luvia took out one of her lesser gems – an orange spinel – and lobbed it towards the centre of the room. A faint thud where the stone landed, followed immediately by a sudden chill in the air and a loud snap as another ice spear shattered itself on top of it.

A cautious opponent then, one that preferred to hide and strike only at the most opportune moment, from a position of safety. One sufficiently suspicious of her gems to seek to neutralize them on the spot. And likely to expect similar cowardice from Luvia herself. She could use that to her advantage.

Placing both hands on the side of her summoned wall, she drew power from her Magic Crest and channeled it into the rough clay. With her family's powerful affinity for the element of earth, it was easy enough to transform it from a stationary wall into a wave of crashing dirt and stone. It surged before her, crushing furnishings and panelling alike. Rather than wait for the dust to clear, Luvia boldly threw herself forward and followed closely in its wake. When she saw the earth part in two, giving way before a shimmering barrier of suspended water, she grit her teeth and leapt forward.

The pressure of roaring water was brutal, almost enough to force her back, but enhanced limbs and sheer momentum carried her through. Luvia briefly registered a dark-haired woman at the center, eyes wide and mouth opened wide in surprise, before swinging her fist with enough force to shatter iron. It connected directly with the woman's jaw; there was a sickening crack as bone splintered and her target was thrown backwards. The enemy magus hit the floor and laid still, sprawled on the broken remains of hardwood. Whether she was dead or simply unconscious, she had least been put out of commission.

Luvia panted, catching her breath, then looked back to where Mikael was still grappling with his monstrous opponent. His coat and shirt had been shredded to pieces by claw and fang, yet his skin showed only the most superficial of wounds. Even as she watched, the edges knitted themselves back together, dark bruises vanishing like snow under sunshine. And no wonder – his weapon was embedded in the beast's right flank, drawing blood to simultaneously drain its strength and power his own unnatural regeneration.

Judging from the way the beast groaned in protest under her cousin's crushing hands, and the sluggishness of its limbs, it would not last much longer. She was just debating whether to fire a bolt through its head, to speed things along, when she caught a flicker of movement in her peripheral vision.

She dodged to one side, but not quite quickly enough. Sharp pain blossomed in her left shoulder, forcing an anguished cry from her. She whirled around as another familiar advanced from an inner door, a creature with the powerful body of a lion, a withered man's face split by a cruel leer, and a segmented tail bristling with sharp quills. One of which, she knew without looking, was now embedded in her flesh. Venomous too, judging from the burning chill that was slowly spreading from the wound.

 _Stay calm_ , she told herself even as she ducked behind an overturned table just in time to avoid a volley of quills. _Remember the field report_. While the scales could be penetrated with enough sheer force, it was more efficient to look for vulnerable areas – membranes, joints, internal organs.

Risking a quick look from around her impromptu shelter, she saw that this familiar did not look nearly as well-armoured as the one that Rin and Marco had faced. As disconcerting as it was to face a beast with a human head, that naked flesh offered an obvious weak point.

She felt through the pockets sewn into her dress with her right hand, extracting a brilliant fire opal. Ignoring the weakness spreading through her left side, she stood up from behind the table and fiercely slung the gem directly at the creature's face. It was one of her finer stones, densely packed with stored mana; the resulting explosion tore through the familiar's pallid meat, splattering gore and charred flesh across the back panelling. Another gem detonated within that mass of tortured flesh, and the thing was blown to bloody scraps.

Luvia reached out for the table with a trembling hand to catch her breath. She looked at her pierced shoulder and winced; the quill had lodged itself deeply, and the surrounding skin was an unhealthy gray. Gritting her teeth, she caught the protruding end of the spine and yanked it out. She gasped in pain, her vision momentarily turning black, before she recovered herself and searched for another stone. After a bit of fumbling, she placed a round-cut emerald against the room and murmured the spell, feeling a warm tingling as mana flooded the wound and flushed out the poison.

She whipped her head up suspiciously at the sound of approaching footsteps, then sighed in relief as she saw Mikael approach, blood-soaked and cheerful. He looked over at the blasted corpse of the manticore and gave a low whistle of appreciation. "They certainly put out the red carpet for us, didn't they?"

Despite the lingering pain, Luvia couldn't resist lifting her lips in an answering grin. "I would be insulted if we received anything less than their very best." She brushed the dust off her dress and briefly surveyed the room before nodding at the unconscious magus on the floor. "I believe that is Ekaterina, Stanislav Durnovo's eldest niece. Rogday's first cousin."

"Still breathing, I see. Not by much though. Shall I finish her off?" he asked, in the same careless tone he might ask whether she wanted a spider crushed underfoot.

"No, get Frans and his men to secure her. If things go sour, she may yet have use as a hostage."

"Doubtful, from what I've heard about Rogday. But have it your way."

"Let's move on," she said loftily, as if she were standing in her usual office and not in the ruins of her enemy's parlour. "Jacopo's map said that the basement passage is hidden in the study, through the library doors over there."

Luvia resumed her stride, Mikael falling into place at her side. "If nothing else," she said, "the Durnovos should be running out of summoned lackeys to throw at us."

* * *

It soon became apparent that Luvia had been wrong in that assumption, very wrong. With each step of their journey through the manor and its subterranean corridors, they were assailed by numerous familiars, each more twisted and brutal than the last. She had only the vaguest impressions of dark wood furniture and elegant light fixtures before they were destroyed by violent impacts or stray blasts of magic.

Luvia threw another sapphire, freezing and shattering a nightmarish gargoyle in their path, even as Mikael's weapon flew through the air to impale another. She took mental stock of how many gems she had left, and winced. Despite months of preparation, storing mana in a wide assortment of stones, the relentless pressure was swiftly eating through her reserves. By her tally, she had only four left. And yet the fiends kept coming.

 _How on earth can the Durnovos sustain so many familiars?_ But she already knew the terrible answer to that, even before she smelt the metallic reek of blood from behind locked doors. Steeling herself, she kicked open the doors, and almost gagged as the stench became powerful enough to feel like a wall.

She raised a sleeve to cover her nose and ventured onto red-smeared tiles, her footsteps echoing in the gory chamber. Countless human bodies had been strung up on racks, expertly bisected so that the blood ran down shattered limbs and collected into metal buckets placed beneath them. Somehow the cold precision made it worse, human beings reduced to simple meat for the butcher's block.

She watched as a few crimson droplets fell from a limp hand, landing in the bucket with thin _plunks_ , and felt her revulsion turn to burning anger. The grated doorways in the south side of the room looked like they led to prison cells, and could safely be ignored. Her business lied beyond the ornate door of carved mahogany that instinct told her led to the Durnovos' workshop.

Luvia felt more than heard Mikael reluctantly pull away from the mostly empty buckets to follow her as she strode across the room. She had expected the door to be magically locked, but it swung open easily.

No time to think about this, or fear would catch up and choke her.

She stepped through.

* * *

Jacopo stalked through the upper halls of the Durnovo manor, eyes fixed on the closed door at the end of the rich burgundy carpet. He already knew that it led to the personal study of Stanislav Durnovo, the family's patriarch, for he had been forced to walk through this accursed house once before. If all went to plan tonight, he would never have to do so again.

Once the assault had gotten well underway, the enemy's troops were preoccupied with Edelfelt's carnage on the northern side. He had been able to slip through the southern entrance with a team of his best men. Admittedly best hadn't been good enough, as they had all been messily melted by hidden wards or torn apart by scaled abominations. But their deaths had been a worthwhile sacrifice. They had allowed him to come this far.

As he approached the end of the hallway, the study door slowly swung open, as if pushed by an invisible hand. It appeared his old adversary desired this confrontation as much as he did. He allowed himself a small smile as he summoned his shadows, cloaking himself in liquid darkness before stepping in.

The study was exactly as he remembered it, filled with excessively ornate and indulgent furniture of rare woods and heavy felts, and further encumbered by rows of shelves cluttered with second-rate treatises. Stanislav was looking out the window, seemingly lost in thought as he stroked his carefully trimmed beard. His watery gray eyes seemed focused on the battle raging below, but Jacopo was not fooled for a moment. And indeed, the instant that the Vendramin elder crossed the threshold, a red glow lit the room as a Bounded Field firmly took hold along all four walls.

"It took you long enough to get here. You are getting old, Vendramin." Stanislav slowly turned to face him. He looked mildly annoyed, as if he were reprimanding a particularly dull servant, but the façade was belied by the hatred burning in his eyes.

"The same could be said of you." Jacopo let his shadows spill around him, cautiously tasting the air, before stiffening in surprise. "Empty. Where are your Codes, your familiars? How do you intend to fight?"

The Durnovo elder gave a short bark of laughter, as bitter as wormwood. "I have given my power to my heir. Unlike you, I have faith in my progeny. You think so little of yours that you have not even brought him to battle."

Stanislav watched the other carefully, looking for a flinch, a subtle lowering of the eyes, any sign of weakness. When none seemed forthcoming, he huffed and spread his arms. "No matter. Even if you kill me, the power I have poured into this field will keep even a fiend like you trapped here for hours. Long enough for Rogday to hunt down and kill your coward of a son. Then your servants, then your hired rabble, before he finally comes for you too." Then he added, with malicious glee, "How does it feel to be helpless, Vendramin? Knowing that your clan faces destruction, and there is nothing you can do to stop it."

"I see," said Jacopo, a faint smirk ghosting across his lips. "Why Stanislav, I am flattered. Even with a mythic relic at your command, one almost tailored to protect your familiars from my arts, you fear me. You fear me enough to resort to this petty divide-and-conquer scheme. "

"Do not flatter yourself by claiming strength that you've merely borrowed," said the other contemptuously as he waved back towards the window. "You would never have gotten this far without bringing outsiders into this ancestral feud. And in doing so, you have sullied us both." His lip curled in disgust. "You really are an honourless dog."

"You would have done the same, if anyone would risk allying with House Durnovo. But even the most desperate mercenaries would think twice, with such a sinister reputation behind you."

"And whose fault is that?" roared Stanislav. "How dare you stand there and lecture _me_ about sinister reputations and morality? How _dare_ you, after what you did to her?" Icy blue tendrils of power began gathering around his hands. "How many years did you trap her in your cursed abyss?"

"You could have stopped it any time," observed Jacopo dispassionately, even as he drew his shadows thicker around himself. "All you had to do is surrender. Blame yourself for preferring your vaunted honour to your wife."

There was a strangled cry of rage, a clash of flaring blue light and pulsing black tendrils. Then Stanislav's body fell heavily to the ground, pierced by dark energies in more than a dozen places.

Jacopo took a moment to gaze down at it, savouring the sight with grim pleasure, before considering the barrier encasing him in the study. As much as it pained him to admit, it was an impressive piece of magecraft. Judging from the strength of the seals keeping it in place, it would take hours to even begin weakening its power.

He gritted his teeth and set to his task. Hopefully Edelfelt would take care of Rogday, or at least weaken him. But even if she failed, Jacopo could find some comfort in knowing that his heir was safely away from the manor.

* * *

It was indeed a workshop, although quite different from the cluttered tables and packed shelves that Luvia generally associated with the term. She found herself in a large room, walking on highly polished marble lit by elaborate chandeliers. There were occasional small tables and stands of books and equipment, but they were clearly designed for aesthetics as much as functionality. Two arches surmounted oversized doors that must lead to further rooms beyond. She idly wondered if the display was intended to impress their summoned familiars; perhaps the Durnovos had not relied so heavily on beasts in the past.

A permanent magic circle had been carved onto a slab of stone in the center, with deep grooves and hollows for the placement of reagents. Not far from the circle, a fountain of thick red liquid burbled down into a shallow pool, surrounded by statues of fierce chimeras. It still smelled like blood, but the sharp coppery scent was undercut with an unexpected sweetness.

The fountain did not seem immediately harmful, but Luvia was still inclined to give it a wide berth as she headed towards the closest of the arch-framed doors. The same could not be said of Mikael. He sniffed the air with growing delight as he allowed his feet to carry him towards the crimson spray.

"Mikael, I do not trust that circle or that fountain. Stay away from them."

That should have settled the matter, but still her cousin advanced towards the rippling surface of the pool. "It smells so good," he murmured to himself, as if in a dream. "Just a little taste."

"Mikael! I forbid it!"

She lunged towards him, grabbing him around the shoulder. It was not enough to stop him from shooting forward the _Karhu pää_ , so that the gauntlet sunk deeply into the pool. She was helpless to stop the weapon from hauling up great quantities of blood with a loud suction noise, all of it pumping directly into her cousin's veins.

His mouth slackened as the liquid filled him, his eyes becoming glazed and reddened before drooping shut. He swayed heavily in her grasp before pitching forward; she nearly staggered under his weight. As she carefully lowered him to the floor, a low rumble emitted from his open mouth. It took her a moment to recognize it as a snore.

She felt a stab of anger, fueled by fear. "I cannot believe you! Why now, of all times?"

"He _has_ just drunk enough to fell a young elephant," said a smooth masculine voice. Luvia looked up sharply; the furthest door had opened, and a young man had stepped into the room with them. She easily recognized Rogday Durnovo, his ash-brown hair and soft grey eyes entirely at odds with his wolfish grin. She reached for one of her few remaining gems as she rose to her feet.

"Poison?" Luvia muttered. "But that's impossible, his –"

"- Mystic Code filters out all toxins from the blood it feeds him?" He had the nerve to look amused. "Civilized men rightly consider alcohol a poison. But your brutish ancestors would never have designed a weapon that prevented them from getting stupid drunk, would they?" He laughed, a raucous sound that carried over the noise of the fountain.

"My forebears, brutish? Rather hypocritical of you, considering the abattoir I just passed through."

"Come now, no need for that. As a magus, you should understand all about making use of available tools. As you prepared by storing mana in your jewels, we prepared by stocking food for our familiars."

"You are taking about human beings."

"Of course. Our beasts are fond of human souls and flesh alike," he said dismissively. He looked around the room and clicked his tongue. "As I thought, Marco's nowhere to be seen. I guess he really is as much of a coward as I always thought."

He took a few steps towards her, and seemed pleased when she held her ground. "At least here I see courage. Tell me Edelfelt, won't you consider taking a contract from my House instead?"

"I think not," she said, answering his smile with one of her own.

"Is it the bodies? Hmm, I never expected such sentimentality from the head of Edelfelt." But instead of the smirk she had expected, he looked at her searchingly. It was as if he were truly seeing her for the first time. "If such things bother you, why are you working for the Vendramin? Don't you know what they've done, with those damnable shadows of theirs?"

"That does not matter," she said, forcing herself to meet his gaze despite her discomfort. "For the moment, they are my employer. As such, I am theirs to command. If they are as vile as you say, I can always deal with them after our contract has expired."

"They're particularly vulnerable right now, you know. They can't have more than a dozen retainers left alive. You could finish them off and help yourself to anything in their house."

"What is an honest mercenary?"

"The same as an honest politician. One that once bought, stays bought," said Rogday with a grim smile.

"Indeed," she agreed. "Besides, I am here for the skull of Gorynych. Would you be willing to hand it over?"

"Never. It is rightfully ours."

"Then there was never any possibility of agreement. We can fight with no regrets."

Rogday threw his head back and laughed. "Very good. Shall we, then?"

Even before he'd finished speaking, Luvia had begun drawing power from her Magic Crest. She released it now as a series of supercharged _Gandr_ shots, bursts of crackling energy that screamed towards the Durnovo heir.

But as she had researched her prey, it appeared her opponent had done the same. He was already to one side, dodging her shots with preternatural agility. Even as he ran, he muttered furiously under his breath. Moments later, black smoke began pouring from his hands, leaving dark trails in his wake that she nimbly moved around as she pursued her quarry.

A brief glance over her shoulder, and she saw the smoke begin to coalesce into some kind of solid object. The hint of wings forming, pointed jaws and dark scales. She cursed under her breath. Not the summoning of a new familiar, but the manifestation of one that had been lurking in the room in dematerialized form. How had she failed to notice it when she walked into the room?

The saving grace was that it had not appeared fully formed, although it was rapidly gaining substantiality. A window of vulnerability, of opportunity. She hurled a gleaming topaz and hoped for the best. She was rewarded when the mana stored in the gem exploded into fierce ripping winds, tearing away the smoky figure with it.

 _Three left now_.

She had no time to mourn her dwindling ammunition, as a sudden movement in her peripheral vision reminded her that she was not alone. She threw her forearm up just in time to deflect Rogday's dagger away from her exposed throat, but still staggered back under the force of his sudden strike. Blood streamed from her arm where the skidding blade had torn away the skin. Still Luvia grinned as she counterattacked, lashing out with a series of vicious kicks that Rogday avoided only by throwing himself far to the side.

Panting hard, a short distance from each other, each combatant eyed the other warily as they caught their breath. Rogday shifted his blade to one side, apparently considering his best angle of attack, when he suddenly stiffened.

Then his tense expression melted away into one of delight. " _Maaarco,_ " he breathed, then abruptly began walking away from her, towards the blood-soaked chamber that led to the main manor. "Please excuse me. I need to greet my newest guests."

If Marco Vendramin had arrived, then Rin was with him. Of course the stubborn girl would defy Luvia every step of the way, even on things that were for her own good. Angry as Luvia was, she could reprimand Rin later. For now, it was enough to know that she couldn't let Rogday get away from her.

" _Gandr!_ " she yelled, wildly pulling from her mana reserves as she unleashed another salvo of charged shots at the Durnovo's retreating back.

At the last possible moment, his body suddenly jerked to one side, as if pulled by an invisible force. Of the dozen curses that should have torn into him, only the shot on the extreme left connected. He bit back a scream as he stumbled forward from the impact, but he looked steady enough as he turned back towards her.

"I regret having to do this," he seethed between gritted teeth. "Marco really should have been the first to see her. What a touching reunion it would have been. But you're not leaving me much of a choice."

A clap of his hands and a guttural command in a language that even she, an accomplished polyglot, was unable to recognize. The ornate door closest to them did not so much open as it burst outwards with a loud crack, torn entirely off its hinges by incredible force.

Then heavy footsteps, and a scaled monstrosity lurched into the room. Unlike the familiars that Luvia had already fought, the creature was distinctly humanoid despite its sharp reptilian snout and the thick, greenish-black scales that covered its body. Its talons were comparatively small, its wings and tail stunted and vestigial, and yet it felt far more dangerous. Perhaps it was because unlike the other beasts, this creature felt undeniably solid, completely present in this world.

Then it turned to look at Luvia, and she took a step back. Despite their golden sheen, the narrowly slitted pupils, there was something familiar about its eyes. Something terribly human.

"Clémence?" she breathed, taking a step backward. "Rogday, you - !" she turned to abuse him, only to find that he had taken advantage of her distraction to vacate the room. That sounded like a fine idea, she thought to herself as she darted towards Mikael, intent on hauling him over her shoulder and following her enemy to the upper floors. But she had scarcely taken a step when the creature threw itself between her and her kinsman with astonishing speed.

She could see the tension in its outstretched limbs, the angry gleam in its eyes, and expected it to open its jaws wide to lunge at her. But instead the creature's mouth remained firmly shut even as it – she? - loomed over the blonde, so that an eerie silence descended on the room, interrupted only by the ripple of the fountain and Mikael's steady snoring.

 _When in doubt, command_. That was the way of nobility.

Luvia drew herself up to her full height and looked steadily at the creature. "Stand aside," she declared in a tone that brooked no possibility that she would be disobeyed. "I have no quarrel with you." Still, she couldn't quite stop herself from nervously fingering the sapphire clutched in her hand.

Golden eyes stared at her a moment more, the head tilting ever so slightly to one side. Then suddenly the creature gave a low groan of agony, half-staggering as if hit by a sudden blow to her plated stomach. She pawed clumsily at her head with her talons as Luvia stepped back warily, gem at the ready.

Abruptly, as if a switch had just been flipped, the head snapped up again, eyes now blazing with pain and madness. An ominous reddish light glowed from between her fangs, along with a whiff of sulphur so powerful Luvia could smell it even over the blood-scent that still permeated the room.

Luvia slung the sapphire just as the creature's mouth opened wide and unleashed a fiery blast. She had a brief vision of devouring flames, red brightening to yellow then eye-searing white, before it was cut off by brilliant blue light and freezing air. Competing elements clashed violently, releasing a shockwave that almost threw magus and beast alike to the ground.

Luvia caught her balance, then moved to put some distance between them as she considered the thing that had once been Marco's fiancée. The creature was already lurching towards her, eager to reach out and hurt someone, anyone, in her pain.

 _This is unfair!_ Luvia thought wildly, indignantly. _Rin's report didn't say anything about dragon breath!_

To make matters worse, the magus couldn't see any obvious weak spots. No human face with soft flesh, no delicate membranes, a mouth that opened only to unleash torrents of flame. Even the eyes were protected under scaled ridges; not an impossible target, but a difficult one.

It occurred to Luvia that she might be in over her head after all.

* * *

Tires rumbled on the pavement of the Durnovo Manor's circular driveway as the car came to a halt. With the Bounded Field down, the locked front gates had not stood a chance against two impatient magi.

Rin got out of the vehicle, glancing briefly at the scorched earth and crumbled brickwork surrounding her. Mangled bodies as well, just visible in the light of small fires still burning in the wreckage. The air smelled sharply of ozone.

It was clear that the assault had been a success so far, at least as far as breaching the house. That did nothing to alleviate the fear coiling in her gut, or the pounding of her heart. Marco seemed equally tense as he came to stand by her.

Another car rolled up, disgorging Nylund and his team of retainers. Rin still felt like punching him for his part in Luvia's deception, but forced herself to nod at him as he approached. "Any luck reaching her?"

"No, although that's to be expected if they made it to the underground complex." Seeing her blank expression, he continued, "Wireless devices cannot generally carry signal underground."

"Hmph. Anyone else?"

"Transmissions are garbled. But from what I was able to make out from Master Frans, they are facing more resistance than expected."

"Sounds like we're on our own, then. The plan called for Luvia to go in through the north wall, so that's our best bet for catching up. Let's go."

Without waiting to see if they would follow, Rin sped towards the north wall. Upon approach, she could see an opening that had been roughly blasted through the wall. Beyond looked like the remains of a demolished sitting room, marred by the scars of battle; claw marks and blackened earth and puddles of melted water.

"Looks like we're on the right track," said Marco beside her, apprehension and determination alike written in his frown. She nodded curtly and moved towards the opening, but had only taken three steps before she felt a slight tremor in the earth below them. It was very faint and easy to ignore, but she hadn't made it through the War without paying attention to even subtle changes in her environment. A few more tentative steps, and as she had anticipated, the vibrations increased dramatically.

Rin unceremoniously grabbed Marco by the back of his coat and abruptly yanked him backwards just as the earth ahead of them erupted in a shower of dirt and debris. Long ivory claws, perfect for digging and each as long as her forearm, each as large as her forearm, emerged from the dust, followed by the bulk of an armored carapace carried on segmented legs. The brute looked almost more insectoid than reptilian, but the scaly texture of its armored plates made it clear that this was yet another of Gorynych's brood.

"That's … that's it!" yelled Marco, bristling with hatred, "That's the thing that took Clémence."

The familiar had no visible eyes, but still it turned a heavily-plated head in his direction.

" _Maaarco_ …"

The voice came from the beast's mouth, but it was disarmingly human, a soft masculine voice full of malicious glee.

"Rogday, you bastard! Give her back!"

Shadows began thrashing violently around the Vendramin heir, fueled by his rage. At the same time the familiar drew itself up, surprisingly agile despite its bulk. A loathsome blue tongue rapidly darted in and out, tasting the air, before stalking towards him.

Such a powerful beast could have given even the Edelfelt forces difficulty, so why had it emerged only now? _Because Rogday hates Marco as much as Marco hates him_. Because this thing had been ordered to wait and ambush the Vendramin heir, no matter who else passed it by. But now its target had arrived, and it was ready to fight.

As her fellow magus began slashing furiously away at the beast with his shadows, it became clear that the thing was focused entirely on him. It occurred to Rin that she could slip right by it to search for Luvia, and it wouldn't pay her the slightest heed. It was a damn tempting thought.

Tempting, but… with all that heavy armor, and its draconic magic resistance, this was the very sort of monster that Vendramin magecraft would be unable to pierce. No doubt Rogday had chosen it for this very reason.

Luvia could at this very moment be in a fight for her life; be bleeding out after being crushed under rubble. If Rin delayed, she might die. _Might_. But leaving Marco here alone with the familiar meant abandoning him to almost certain death. And she might need his aid in whatever horror that Luvia might be dealing with even now. Rin just had to believe that Luvia was fine, that the blonde magus could take care of herself.

She had to have faith.

Rin couldn't quite repress a snort. What a laughable concept, so very unlike a magus.

"Nylund, you and your team go ahead and assist Luvia. The staircase down is through the library and study. Go!" she ordered, even as she gritted her teeth and turned to face the armored monstrosity. Whatever Nylund thought of Rin's familiar term of address for his mistress, or her presumption in taking command, he didn't argue. They swiftly disappeared into the ruined room and further into the manor.

Well, faith didn't mean Rin couldn't try to take some practical steps too.

* * *

 **Author's note** : I'd apologize for the delay in getting this chapter out – I had a work crunch the last few weeks – but lateness is pretty much par for the course for me. Thanks folks for sticking with me despite how I keep dragging my feet on posting.

Rin was right way back in Chapter 4 about a woman screaming endlessly in the dark. She was just wrong about which woman it was, and who put her there.

Rogday based his plan to knock Mikael out of battle on the Egyptian myths surrounding Ra and Sekhmet. Ra sent the normally peaceful Hathor down in the form of Sekhmet, the lioness war goddess, to destroy humans that were wicked and refused to follow the principles of Ma'at. She became so violent that even after the battle ended, she slaughtered humans without limit to drink their blood. To save the humans that were left, Ra poured out beer dyed with red ochre or pomegranate to look like blood. Mistaking the blood for beer, Sekhmet became so drunk that she gave up killing and returned peacefully to Ra. I meant to include it in dialogue, but I couldn't get it to fit naturally. So just imagine Rogday thinking smugly about this myth while he watches Mikael sucking up the fountain.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Flames collided against the earthen wall that Luvia had hastily erected, boiling the air around her to an almost unbearable heat. She barely had time to catch her breath before she heard a pain-maddened snarl from the other side. She moved back just as Clémence hurled her monstrous bulk through the wall, pushing through rock and clay with sheer muscle power; power far beyond what a human could achieve even with Reinforcement magic.

Luvia threw up another wall to buy time, her mind racing as she considered her options. They weren't promising. Exploratory _Gandr_ shots and elemental blasts had proved unable to pierce through the creature's hide, and her defensive walls did little more than inconvenience it. Even with the power of the renowned Edelfelt crest, backed by her superior array of magic circuits, there was only so long she could hold out against Clémence's furious attacks. Already her limbs were beginning to feel heavier, her head swimming with the aching pain and dizziness that indicated her mana reserves were running low. It didn't help that Luvia had to carefully maneuver to avoid Mikael's sleeping form, lest he be carelessly trampled or burned by her enraged foe.

She would not win a war of attrition against this enemy. She had to finish this now, with a decisive strike, before mana starvation really set in.

Another sudden crash and shower of dry dirt as Clémence burst through the new wall, but Luvia was already running. She risked a look back over her shoulder at her pursuer, forcing herself to search again for weak points. The eye, as protected as it was, still remained her best target. Now she just needed a distraction. The blonde magus' eyes happened to rest on the fountain, with its surrounding pool of adulterated blood. She thought back to the field report, and inspiration struck.

Luvia circled around the far edge of the pool, drawing out her last two gems as she moved. She didn't need to look at them recognize them as two of her finest gems, a brilliant citrine and a deep blue sapphire, both densely packed with mana. Her lips whispered against the yellow stone's surface, warmth radiating from it in response to her muttered incantation as she set a delay on its detonation. Then she let fly another volley of _Gandr_ shots at her opponent to force her back, even as she quietly dropped the citrine into the pool, its fall obscured by the curtain of shimmering blood.

Then she jumped, narrowly avoiding Clémence's frenzied rush. Talons scored the floor where the blonde magus had just been standing. Luvia moved back and raised her hand threateningly as her foe stalked towards her, counting the seconds under her breath.

 _Three… two… one…_

The pool exploded violently behind them, propelling blood outwards to splatter all over the white stone of the floor and walls. Clémence snapped her head towards the unexpected disturbance, momentarily exposing her right eye as it focused on the chaos.

Luvia launched herself forward, slinging the sapphire with unerring precision to hit just under the scaly ridge, directly into that golden orb.

The stone flew straight and true – then collided with a talon, raised with unbelievable speed to block its path. It exploded with a blast of icy cold that engulfed the creature's entire hand in shimmering ice.

Moments later the ice shook apart with loud snaps. A coating of white frost lingered on hideously cracked scales, not quite obscuring the angry red of wounded flesh beneath. But as unpleasant as the injury looked, it was nowhere near as incapacitating as Luvia needed it to be.

Clémence moved her damaged hand this way and that, considering it with an interest that bordered on admiration. Rather like a young man looking at an accidental cut self-inflicted while handling a favourite blade. It was a disarmingly human gesture. Then Clémence raised her head to meet Luvia's gaze, the edge of her lip curling up in something resembling a wry smile.

They stared at each other for a long moment, an unplanned eye in the storm of their battle. Then Clémence doubled over, heaving and gasping as a renewed wave of pain washed through her. When she looked back up, her eyes had glazed over again. The pressure in her frame seemed to concentrate in her torso then bulge in her throat, as a faint whiff of sulphur again filled the air. The precursor to another blast of dragon breath.

Luvia was out of gems and running low on mana, but thanks to Rin, she wasn't entirely out of options. She could only hope the Japanese magus wouldn't be completely insufferable about it when Luvia caught up with her.

A sharp tug readily broke the straps, and the Jewelled Blade was in her hand. It hummed softly in her grip as she let prana flow to loosely connect her magic circuits to it. Looking at the rainbow pattern of its gems, their softly glimmering radiance, she could feel the Kaleidoscope begin to open, the veil between worlds parting ever so slightly. Enough that she could begin to siphon the mana she desperately needed.

But as she began pulling on that energy, the strain on her magic circuits sharpened into excruciating pain. It took every ounce of willpower to keep her grip on the dagger when every nerve in her arm was screaming at her to drop it. Fortunately she managed to swing it down, unleashing a flare of magical power just in time to cut down the raging flames that threatened to consume her.

Luvia took a step back and forced herself to draw from the blade again as Clémence rushed forward with drawn talons. The burst almost dropped the creature to her knees, even as Luvia bit her lip until it bled.

As much as she appreciated the influx of mana, using the blade hurt. Every swing sent cold fire up her arm and through her body. To think that Rin had used this weapon again and again to banish her sister's shadows, borne this pain again and again. Admiration and pride warred within her, both fueling her determination.

"I am heir to the Edelfelt clan! I will _not_ be shown up by Tohsaka Rin!" she declared, if more to herself than her opponent. "And certainly not in front of Marco," she added. Not that his shadows were anything as impressive as her arts, of course, which surely Rin would recognize.

She forced mana from the blade again as she braced herself for another attack. It never came. She looked up in surprise to see Clémence instead shaking her heavy head back and forth. She opened her mouth again, but without the consuming fire that usually followed.

"Maaaargh-oooooh," Clémence rasped, before covering her head with her scaled hands, wounded and healthy alike.

Luvia stared at her, taken aback by the creature actually speaking, before the meaning registered. Even through her impelled madness, she could still recognize the name of her beloved. It was touching and harrowing in equal parts.

Forcing herself to keep a steady tone, she offered her open palm. "Yes, Marco is upstairs. Shall we go see him together?"

But instead of looking interested, Clémence shook her head again, more violently than ever.

"You do not wish him to see you in this state? I do not think -"

A frustrated hiss split the air. Luvia was forced to take a step back as Clémence threw down her talons, cracking the marble at her feet. Then she lifted them again and pantomimed impaling something on them. The magus felt sick to her stomach as understanding set in.

"You are afraid that you will hurt him."

Clémence gave a sharp nod, then lowered her head and tilted it up to directly expose her eye. The invitation was only too clear.

Luvia could understand the reasoning. It was likely that whatever geas was controlling her would only redouble in strength if Rogday's main target arrived on the scene. Not to mention that after repeated exposure to Gorynych's essence over long months, her transformation was likely permanent. It was a mercy kill, really. But even as she raised the dagger for the delivering strike, she found herself hesitating.

Clémence growled in impatience, her body wracked with agony as she struggled to maintain control. She decided to force the issue by throwing herself at Luvia, talons outstretched and fangs snapping furiously. But the movements were slower than before, deliberately sloppy. As she passed, her eye once again opened wide to stare at the blonde.

This time, Luvia found her nerve.

The Jewelled Blade was primarily a ritual tool. It was neither sharp nor easy to wield, but it was still a dagger. Its crystal tip plunged easily into the soft tissue of the eye. Black ichor welled up around it, even as Clémence shrieked in pain. Then a hard pull on Luvia's circuits that sent agony shooting down her arm, and she detonated the core of the blade.

Even with the majority of the explosion hemmed in by Clémence's skull, its power was still enough to send Luvia flying backwards. Her back hit the edge of the fountain's basin, hard and painful, before her body slid down to rest on the floor. But that sensation paled next to the throbbing ache from her right hand and wrist, from which the blade had been violently torn when detonated. The smallest movement, even a small twitch of the fingers, caused acute spasms of pain, as if she were slamming the hand on broken glass.

Luvia forced herself into a sitting position, biting her lip to keep from whimpering as she brought up her wounded arm to cradle it protectively against her. She let her gaze stray to the smoking corpse on the ground, a thin trail of black smoke rising from the crater blasted in the side of the scaled head. Then she turned her head away. It felt somehow obscene to stare at that twisted form, all that was left of a young woman pulled into a conflict beyond her control or understanding. A pawn among countless others in the endless vendettas of the old families.

No time for that now, she reminded herself. The living needed her. She propped herself forward, intending to get to her feet, but renewed flares of pain dissuaded her. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the cool stone of the basin, breathing deeply against her endless aches. She just needed to rest for a moment, to recoup her strength. Just for a moment.

* * *

Rin hoped that Marco's stamina had improved since their last mission together, because it looked like he wasn't going to get a moment of respite from the massive beast dogging his heels. Although apparently blind, it could hear very well, and sensed vibrations in the air and ground even better.

It probably would have already caught the Vendramin heir had it been willing to simply impale him on one of its long digging claws. But the beast was careful in its pursuit, swinging at him with controlled blows in attempts to knock him down or hobble him. No doubt so it could bring him alive to Rogday, who would do God knew what to him.

The familiar had displayed no such restraint in relation to Rin when she had gotten in its way, slowing it down with alternating blasts of flames and ice. It had swung viciously at her, the killing intent clear in the savagery of its strikes. Then it seemed to forget all about her again as soon as she backed away, hurling itself through Marco's shadows in its relentless pursuit of him.

As insulting as it was, it did offer her valuable opportunities to observe their enemy. The familiar had few weak points when it was at rest or moving slowly, its armor clamped tightly around its frame for maximum protection. But if it needed to move with speed – even now she saw it lunge towards Marco, thwarted only when one of his shadowy arms snatched him out of the way – it had to spread its segmented legs wider to cover more ground. Which exposed gaps in the armor near their joints, especially from beneath. And with its single-minded focus on its prey…

She cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted. "Marco!" It took a few tries before the panting magus turned to look at her, even as he dodged another swing of claws. "Use your shadows to put yourself in the air above it!"

"How will that help?" he gasped out as he narrowly evaded his pursuer. "It's got even more armor on top!"

"Just trust me and do it!" she said, pointing up to direct him towards where she wanted him. She didn't wait to see if he would comply, instead walking as softly as she could towards the side of the beast.

It paid her no mind, instead shifting up to track Marco's ascent into the air atop a column of writhing black tendrils. She could see the tension build in its frame before it leapt up, reaching forward to sink its claws into the shadows and tear them down to get at the magus. Its other legs extended out to plant themselves firmly in the ground, opening up the predicted breaks in their plated scales.

Rin took advantage of the opening, slinging a number of rubies into those gaps with practiced aim. Each stone had been charged with enough mana to overpower a draconic familiar's magic resistance with sheer brute force, and the effects were swiftly seen. The beast's legs exploded at the joints in bursts of heat and light, shocks tearing through unnatural muscles and sinews alike.

The familiar gave a shrill whistle of surprise and pain as several of its legs collapsed from under it. It hauled itself up by its digging claws and turned slowly to face Rin, black blood streaming from mangled stumps. As fiercely as it clacked its jaws, the awkward way it dragged itself forward showed that its mobility had been severely compromised.

Rin allowed herself a small sigh of relief as she backed away from it. Although not down for the count, crippled like this it was far less of an immediate threat. She could leave it to Marco while she went to find Luvia.

She turned towards the opening in the northern wall just in time to see a man emerge from it. Brown hair, grey eyes, right hand loosely gripping a dagger, he was instantly recognizable as Rogday Durnovo. His eager stride suddenly came to a stop when he saw the wounded familiar, still stubbornly dragging itself towards its prey.

Rogday let out a wordless cry somewhere between anger and grief, then broke into run. In her surprise, she let him pass by her as he ran to join his familiar. As he approached it, the beast abandoned its prey to crawl towards him. Then, to her outright astonishment, it nuzzled its massive head against his chest, as if it were a dog greeting its long-absent master. In return, Rogday gently patted its flank as he whispered soothingly to it.

After a moment, Rogday looked up and spotted Marco, who was still panting from his evasive maneuvres. The Durnovo heir's expression immediately darkened, his grip on his dagger tightening until his knuckles turned white.

"Damn you, Marco!" he yelled as he pointed his blade towards the other magus. "What did you do to poor Gregor, you bastard? You and your twisted clan really are hellbent on destroying everything I love."

"You're the one that sicced that thing on us!" shouted Rin, even as she began reaching into her pocket.

"Stay out of this," he snarled, glancing briefly her way. "You're not even really an Edelfelt, let alone a Vendramin. None of this concerns you. If you keep interfering, I'll make sure you regret it."

"You're one to talk about things you love!" interrupted Marco as he approached, his whole body trembling with anger. "How dare you say that, after you took her away." Dark shadows began writhing around him, lashing threateningly in reflection of his fury. "Give Clémence back to me!"

"It was only fair. Your father stole away my mother, I took your bride in return. A wife for a wife."

"You sick bastard- "

"Quiet, you hypocrite!" roared Rogday. "Your father," he spat the word with venom, "tortured her for years on end. Even when we finally managed to shatter the prison, she was never truly free. Can you imagine what it was like, caring for a mother that couldn't even see you, see her family? See the sunlight or the world around her? All she could see, all she could feel, was darkness and cold, no matter what we tried. She wasted away right in front of our eyes."

"That wasn't me!" protested Marco, "I never wanted that!"

"I don't care! I don't even care that you're his son," said Rogday, his voice lowering as hot rage gave way to a colder, more dangerous fury. "But you never tried to help her, not once. Jacopo is a monster, and he does what monsters do. But you knew better. And you let it happen anyway. That's why I'll never forgive you."

"That's not true –"

"Enough with your excuses! I'll avenge her, even if I give up my last breath for it." He smiled, a bitter, broken thing. "Know that Clémence suffers right now. She's suffered for months and she'll die in agony. Die knowing that, Marco."

Rogday rested his hand briefly yet tenderly on the beast's armored carapace, before reaching into under his coat and drawing out a few sheets of folded paper. Even from this distance, Rin could tell they were very old, their spidery script scrawled across faded papyrus. The letters almost seemed to be moving across the page, their curved tips and sharp edges rearranging themselves even as she watched, but that had to be a trick of the light, of her exhaustion.

She was almost relieved when Rogday abruptly crumpled the pages and stuffed them into his mouth, choking them down despite their brittle dryness. But then he began muttering fiercely as he raised his dagger upwards, towards his own neck.

"Don't let him finish!" Taking her own advice, she slung a red spinel towards the enemy magus, hoping its fiery blast would interrupt his spell.

As the stone closed in, the air in front of it suddenly coalesced into a semi-solid figure, a sylph made of the night breeze and starlight. She spread her translucent arms protectively in front of Rogday. The defiant expression on her misty features gave way to a silent scream as the spinel's fiery burst engulfed her. The wind of her body struggled against the flames, pushing them away from her master until both grew weaker and were extinguished together.

The distracting display had given Rogday the time he needed to finish his incantation. There was no hesitation as he plunged his dagger into his own throat. His hand moved jerkily across, dragging the blade with it to open a jagged wound that wept blood, bright red against the white of his shirt.

He staggered and would have fallen had the beast not caught him under the arms and shoulders with its digging claws. It dragged him back into a rough embrace, a bear hugging its trainer. Rogday looked pained but satisfied as he weakly reached up, smearing bloody handprints on his familiar's scaled face.

Then his body began to melt away. There was no other word to describe how the spilled blood began to bubble and froth, eating through flesh and cloth alike until it became a churning mass of gore.

The horror didn't stop there. Not content with having consumed the Durnovo heir in his entirety, the corruption swiftly spread up the beast's arms to cover its bulk, liquefying scaled plates and flesh alike into foul black ichor. The familiar neither screamed nor thrashed, remaining eerily still even as its frame dissolved and contorted into a writhing mass of formless liquid.

Then a thick, powerful tentacle burst through the roiling surface. It was purplish-black in colour, with the smooth slippery skin of a deep sea lurker, and lined with a double row of bristling spines. More appendages erupted from the black ichor to join it, along with gaping maws of serrated fangs arranged in concentric circles reminiscent of a lamprey's mouth.

Soon the mass had fully transformed into a nightmare amalgamation of unnatural limbs and organs. Its towering form blotted out the moon's light as it slowly shifted towards the two magi, as though catching scent of them. It began to crawl towards them, twisting, slithering, its spines rasping audibly against the scarred earth.

Rin found herself unable to look away from the monstrosity as it approached, her blood chilling in her veins. She had already seen countless horrors in her short life, but there was something about those swaying tentacles, those malformed mouths, that pulled at something dark and forgotten in the recesses of her memory -

 _ _–_ Kotone and the other kids were exhausted, but they were safe. The grown-ups would take care of them; that's what grown-ups were did. She could go back home before Mother noticed that she was missing. _

_She was about to go when the magical compass hung around her neck began moving. Slowly at first, but then more and more violently, lightning pulsing from it as it almost jerked off its chain. Her eyes were drawn irresistibly down the alleyway, and she saw it. Something old and strange and wrong, all squirmy tentacles and big teeth. Something that would eat her up or, she sensed instinctually, something even worse. Her fear was immediate and overwhelming, paralyzing her as it moved forward to engulf her._

 _But before it did, there was overwhelming pressure all around her. She was surrounded by the deafening sound of countless insects rushing past her, their fragile wings vibrating as they passed. Distantly she felt herself falling forward into darkness as her vision faded –_

"Rin, move!" This time it was Marco pulling her out of the way, his hands clamped firmly on the sleeve of her coat. Searching tentacles worried the ground where she had been standing before unfurling towards them, smaller tendrils unwinding from within like blossoming undersea flowers. Their alien grace did nothing to take away from the danger of their wicked spines, their poisonous touch.

Rin shook her head to clear the phantoms from her mind, even as the two magi backed away from this newest threat. While the Durnovos' other beasts had displayed some degree of intelligence, she sensed nothing but blind endless hunger from the thing before them.

They could not let it escape the manor grounds. It would eat, and eat, and keep eating until all of St. Petersburg had been reduced to a graveyard. In his quest for vengeance, Rogday had unthinkingly unleashed exactly the sort of blight that Rin had sworn she would work to prevent. She wondered if fate had somehow taken her resolution as a challenge, with how quickly such a scenario had reared its ugly head.

 _Why does everything I touch always seem to spiral out of control?_ Rin asked herself as she reached for her remaining gems.

* * *

Luvia woke to pain and dizziness, and the sensation of someone lightly touching her shoulder. She instinctively reached up to push them away, then immediately regretted it when the movement caused the ache in her right hand to sharpen from dull to excruciating.

"It's okay. It's me, Nylund."

Even through her haze, she recognized her retainer's voice. She let out a breath that she didn't realize she had been holding, then bit back a wince as Nylund gently lifted her forearm to assess the damage.

"Definitely broken," he said. "I'll hold it in place while you fix –"

"No," she sighed. "No, I will need you to splint it." Much as she wished otherwise, she was too drained to repair it through spellcraft.

He looked a little taken aback, and she reflected with grim amusement that this was the first time he had seen her run out of mana and jewels alike. But he didn't argue as he waved across the room at two of his men, where they were trying in vain to revive the sleeping Mikael. A first aid kit was carried over, cardboard splint and tape and bandages rolled out.

Nylund expertly folded the splint, then hesitated before moving to slide it over Luvia's fractured wrist. She took a deep breath then nodded at him, and he got to work.

It hurt, but a magus was born to pain, and trained in enduring it. Instead she forced herself to focus on Nylund's status report, as he described Rin's stubborn order to turn around and return to the manor, their inability to reliably reach the other teams, the monstrous familiar had burst out from under them.

"Did you see Rogday Durnovo?"

"No, we didn't encounter anyone on our way down," commented Nylund as he carefully placed the splinted arm and wrist into a sling, then fastened the sling over her shoulder.

"He must have other ways to the surface. And he must have caught up with them by now." She tested the arm. It hurt, but it would have to do for now. Gritting her teeth, she forced herself to her feet and closed her eyes to ride out a momentary wave of dizziness.

Luvia was frustrated with her own weakness, but she had to face the reality of the situation. She would be hard pressed to fight effectively in her current condition. And that was without considering whatever other malevolent tricks Rogday was sure to still have tucked up his sleeve.

She thought for a moment, her eyes resting on the door from which Rogday had emerged. The door that was still intact, which was more than could be said for its shattered counterpart. If this was indeed the Durnovos' workshop and inner sanctum, then…

"Nylund, gather your team and come with me," she said, walking towards the door with renewed confidence. Despite her lingering pain and the sling immobilizing her arm, her pace had regained its regal bearing. "We will need to do this without the equipment, and we need to hurry."

"What are we doing, Miss Luvia?" Her retainer fell into step beside her.

"We are collecting our prize a little early."

* * *

Shadowy tendrils lashed against the malformed mass, viscous purple fluid oozing from every cut. Bursts of elemental energies struck it, lighting up the night like dying stars. But as soon as wounds appeared, the dark flesh immediately reknit itself.

Rin cursed under her breath as she was forced to dodge to the left, narrowly avoiding a swinging arm covered in serrated teeth. And she wasn't even suffering the worst of it, as the nightmare focused its attention and its endless array of gnashing maws on Marco. Whatever dark rite Rogday had used to birth this horror, he had imprinted the shadow magus as its first target. That was a blessing in its way, because it had made no move to leave the manor grounds. If it did, she thought grimly to herself, there wasn't much they could do to stop it.

Marco was breathing hard now, his shadows visibly thinner. Rin herself was running out of jewels, not that they had proved to be of much use. Even a concentrated blast using several at once had been unable to inflict lasting damage, although it had taken the thing longer to reform.

She racked her brain as she tried to come up with a strategy that would both contain this horror and let Marco and her both escape with their lives. The regeneration might be overcome with sustained firepower, or failing that, a massive attack that could consume the entire calamity at once. She thought regretfully of the ruby pendant that her father had given her. That would have contained more than enough mana for the task at hand. But she had no pendant now, no Heroic Spirit to save her.

What options did that leave, then? Escape and regroup? There would be untold damage to the city, but they might not have a choice. Could they somehow delay it or contain it? But if ice magic had proved ineffective -

Rin heard someone call her name. Turning around, she was greeted by a vision of blue and blonde, her head lifted proudly despite the sling around her neck, the blood splattered across her clothes.

"Luvia!" Rin ran towards her, anger held momentarily back by a flood of relief. Although the blonde was undeniably in rough shape, her eyes burned with life.

Luvia nodded gravely at her. "Rin. I am glad to see you, although this in no way excuses your insubordination."

"At a time like this? You pig-headed-!"

"We can discuss it later. For the moment, I must apologize to you. It seems as though I will be unable to return the Blade you so kindly lent me." She then smiled as she waved behind her. "Please accept this as a replacement."

Rin followed the gesture to see Nylund's team struggling out of the breach in the wall, carrying something heavy between them on a platform supported by horizontal poles. As they got closer, she saw a great, savage-looking skill with long fanged jaws and massive twisting horns. Its eye sockets, dark and empty as they were, still gave the impression of malignant intelligence, of looking down on the mere humans surrounding it. Gorynych's skull.

Even from here, Rin could sense the fierce aura that flowed from it. It was clear that it would be very dangerous to touch it, or even stay close to it for too long. Hence the need for the palanquin on which it was arranged, so that it could be moved and pivoted with a minimum of risk to the practitioner. But as much as Rin longed to study the wonder before her, the ominous rasping and swaying behind her were a powerful reminder that time was short.

Rin locked eyes with Luvia, then looked back at the skull. "You said it's a source of prana. How is it channeled?"

"I'm not sure," the blonde admitted, "The equipment was lost in my grandfather's time. It had many gems and devices involved from what I can remember. But I am sure that you can think of some other method."

Rin couldn't help but look at her in surprise, even more when she received an expectant gaze in return. _Luvia's relying on you_ , she thought to herself. _That's amazing, she never relies on anyone_.

The sound of gunshots rang out. She briefly turned to see the rest of Nylund's team firing rounds into the crawling tentacles. They might as well have tried hewing timber with a penknife, for all the effect their bullets had on that slippery purplish skin.

Rin forced herself to look away from the chaos and approached the skull, feeling her stomach slowly turn to ice as that empty gaze stared back at her. The menace radiating from it was palpable, as if the dragon's malice could reach through the centuries to catch her in its jaws. Remnant though it might be, here was magic in its wildest, most untamed form.

She knew that what she was contemplating was insanity, a suicidal notion before which even Emiya might balk. But she had to try. She had saved Kotone, even if their friendship afterwards hadn't survived the combined weight of Rin's grief and the other girl's fear. Rin was older now, better prepared, and here was her chance to again prove that magecraft did not have to be a scourge on the world. That even something like Gorynych's echo could be used to save instead of ruin. She would prove it to Sakura; to Luvia; perhaps most of all, to herself.

"I have an idea," she said to Luvia as she rolled up her sleeves, her Crest blazing blue-green in the night. "Get Marco to lead it this way."

She walked purposefully to take up a position behind the ancient relic, forcing herself to take deep breaths. To even stand a chance, her will had to be iron, be adamant. She had to be utterly self-assured in her path. She had to be Tokiomi's daughter.

Luvia seemed to realize what she intended. Distantly Rin could hear her commanding her to stop, but she ignored it in favour of stretching her hands down. She placed them firmly on the skull, one above each eye socket, and immediately regretted it.

* * *

 _The world was ablaze with pain, white-hot flares of burning agony originating from her palms to run up her arms and through her limbs to consume every bit of her. The pain from Zurab's fist, from the pull of the Jewelled Blade on her circuits, from hours upon hours of having her Crest implanted, nothing had ever prepared her for pain like this. It was all she could do to fight down the animal panic screaming in her brain, to pull back even the barest inch before she lost herself to it entirely._

 _Between the fires devouring her mind, like glimpses of trees behind choking smoke, she began to feel something. Not so much a voice as a presence, alien thoughts filling her mind with such force that it was difficult to tell where hers ended and these began._

See, mortal. This is fire, this is death, this is my glory. See all tremble and fall before it.

 _Not all. She was Tohsaka Rin, daughter of magi, forged by love and violence alike. She would win mastery here._

 _She felt the intruding presence give way the slightest inch. Not a true mind, she realized, but a ghost of the Zmey's will. But although it was but a shadow, it was still a dragon's shadow, full of terrible fury and pride and thirst for vengeance. Even now it threatened to crush her mental walls and reduce her, body and soul, to ashes._

I won't lose. I can't lose, _she repeated to herself in a litany, thinking of the tentacled nightmare that even now might be destroying the one she cared for_. _The image helped to galvanize her resolve_. I have to destroy that monster, direct this power towards it. Even if I am consumed by it, the fire must burn.

 _Another searing rush of flame scored her mind, but this time it was accompanied by a rush of savage joy. Approval, and the overwhelming sensation of something both gloriously resplendent and incredibly petty._

Yes, let the interloper burn, the insects burn! Let those that seek to contain our majesty in tiny shards die in flames!

 _A rush of power ran from her hands up into the magic circuits situated throughout her body. It felt as if it were burning them all from the inside out as it sped through them and up through her chest, her throat, her jaw. The world exploded into searing white light._

* * *

 **Author's note** : Don't ask what Rogday had to do to get his hands on pages from a copy of Prelati's spellbook. It does not bear thinking about.

 **DschingisKhan** : In fairness, magecraft doesn't _have_ to be horrible. It just so often is, despite the canon characters' best efforts.

 **DessertManiac** : glad you enjoyed the chapter. Things pretty much went from bad to worse, but isn't that always the case with the Fate series? Hope the Blade wasn't too much of an anticlimax, but much more usage and, incomplete as this version was, Luvia's circuits would probably have been burned out completely. Blame Rin for rushed workmanship.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

When Luvia saw Rin pull up her sleeves, she couldn't help but think that the other magus' reputation as a prodigy was apparently not unearned. It was undoubtedly a relief that Rin had come up with some workable means of siphoning mana from the artifact; although of course she _was_ arguably cheating, given her affinity for the Fire element, remaining supply of gems, and access to whatever Mystic Codes that Marco must have held in reserve.

But instead of pulling supplies from her pockets, Rin walked purposefully towards the skull. Her brow was furrowed in an all-too-familiar expression of pained determination that set off warning bells in Luvia's mind. _She cannot possibly be thinking of channeling it directly. It would be insanely dangerous_. That didn't stop Rin continuing her steady advance, fierce eyes fixed on the darkened sockets facing her.

 _She_ is _, damn her._ "Stop, Rin! Stop right there!" yelled Luvia, unable to fully keep the panic from seeping into her voice.

For the second time that day, she watched a ( _loved one_ ) subordinate blatantly ignore her orders in favour of throwing themselves into peril. Even as Luvia broke into a run, the other girl reached down and planted both hands on the skull.

Rin went rigid as soon as her palms made contact. Tension paralyzed her body; her eyes were clenched tight, her mouth twisted in a rictus of pain so crushing she couldn't even scream. Luvia was rushing towards her, to seize her by the arm and somehow stop this madness, when she felt strong fingers close around her own shoulder instead, pull her back.

"You can't, miss. It's too dangerous." She glanced over at the woman, a member of Nylund's team whose name escaped her in the sea of her adrenaline. As Luvia impatiently shook her loose, broken arm be damned, she saw a faint shimmer of light up ahead, from near the skull.

Following it with her eyes, she saw red light begin to glow between the relic's surface and Rin's hands. It intensified to an incandescent yellow-white as it sped up the girl's bared arms, hissing with heat like a serpent's tongue. Its radiance swallowed the blue from her Crest as if it were nothing as it raced through her shoulders, her throat, her mouth. Then her lips parted, and the night became a sea of fire.

Luvia had thought that Clémence had breathed out dragon fire, but now she could see that even those fiery bursts were a pale reflection of the real thing, as alike as a candle flame to a forest fire. This was a voracious inferno, a flame so powerful that it was like a living thing, roaring in the night as it ate up the grass and bricks and everything around it. Even from a distance the heat was overpowering, a blast of scorching air that could have come straight from an industrial furnace. And lost somewhere in that fiery blaze was Rin, so close and yet inexorably out of Luvia's reach.

A towering shadow fell along the ground beside her, thrown in sharp contrast by the light of devouring flames. In her focus on Rin, Luvia had not noticed Nylund guiding Marco back this way, the shambling horror following close behind.

The writhing mass slowed in the face of the heat, showing the intense aversion that all deep-sea lurkers feel for sun and fire. The coiling tentacles began a retreat, but nowhere near quickly enough. The blazing brand that had once been a magus turned in its direction, and the conflagration intensified even more as it engulfed the shadowed flesh. Screams from myriad mouths were drowned out by the rush of wind and flames. Slippery purple skin dried up and curled into black, the abomination's regenerative properties no match for the continuous torrent of dragon fire, so fierce that it consumed even the ashes. Thin trails of noxious smoke briefly rose before being swept away by sheer heat.

Cracks and hisses echoed in the distance as the fire spread to nearby trees, blossoming like malignant red flowers in the darkness. Still the core of the blaze clung to its prey, stubbornly withering the last of its flesh even as it began to subside. As the original fire weakened, so did the unnatural light pouring from the skull and its swaying host.

Luvia ignored the remaining embers in favour of rushing forward to catch the collapsing Rin. Agony flared up in her broken wrist as she shoved herself underneath to bear the weight. She grit her teeth and bore it anyway. And when the blonde was forced to her knees by the other magus' dead weight, she still managed to turn what would have been a free fall into a gentle slide.

Once Luvia had carefully arranged the unconscious Rin on the ground as comfortably as she reasonably could under the circumstances, she anxiously leaned over to assess the damage. The girl's shirt had pretty much been burnt away, her hair singed and smelling of smoke. Of more immediate concern were the burns all over her arms, shoulder and neck, the skin red and blistering. If Luvia had regretted being too low on mana to heal her wrist, she had even more regrets about having nothing left to help Rin.

Her hands shook as she felt at the neck for a pulse, circling her fingertips gently on angry flesh until she felt the delicate throbbing. Weaker than she would have liked, but undeniably there. The iron weight on her lungs finally shifted, and she could breathe again.

At that moment, there was nothing Luvia wanted more than to stay here and keep Rin in her arms, as if she could soothe away the burns with sheer force of will. But the girl needed attention that she couldn't provide, and she herself still had a mission to conduct.

Reluctantly she straightened up, ready to start barking orders at the field medic, but it proved unnecessary. Two of her retainers were already moving to administer first aid, gently kneeling down to cut away the burnt cloth and apply compresses. A stretcher had materialized from somewhere.

Luvia was still watching when she felt a rather forceful tug on the sleeve of her uninjured arm. She cursed under her breath before turning to see Marco Vendramin frowning at her.

"We still have to find Clémence," he said.

Luvia slowly shook her head as she gently worked his fingers loose from her sleeve.

The shadow magus choked. "You can't mean…" He stared at her with wide eyes, pleading with her to say something, anything that could he could hold to his breast as hope.

When Luvia didn't respond, he burst into tears. He looked away, his shoulders hunched defensively, but still she could hear choked sobs as his grief poured out of him. She hesitated – she wasn't very good at comforting people, especially ones that weren't her subordinates – but she felt that she had to try. Even if their mission had turned out to have been impossible from the start, she owed it to him as her client.

"If it is any consolation, she definitely loved you. Right to the very end," she offered.

The man began sobbing even harder, so much so that his voice grew ragged, his breath coming out in strangled gasps. Luvia wondered uncomfortably if she had said the wrong thing.

She decided it would be best to give Marco some space to collect himself. Not to mention that it hurt to hear him, not just for his sake and the sake of the girl she had so briefly met, but also because it was an uncomfortable reminder of how close – but no, she wouldn't dwell on that further. It hadn't happened.

The wind was dying down, and the blaze with it. The nearest vegetation was entirely forfeit, having received the full heat of dragon fire, but she didn't think that it would turn into a full wildfire. The wood surrounding the manor was still relatively young and green, the surrounding air reasonably wet from last week's rains. Unsupported by fresh mana, the flames would eventually die away. They would leave a nasty blackened scar on this patch of earth, though; it would probably be many years before anything green reappeared on this side of the Durnovo house.

Luvia bit her lip and walked over to Nylund, who was busily talking into his transmitter. He cut off the conversation as she approached and nodded respectfully to her.

"Any communication with Jacopo?" she asked.

"No, but Frans said they ran into a bounded field upstairs. Presumably he's somewhere behind that. They've taken up defensive positions while they dismantle it."

She nodded and looked towards the manor doors, wondering if she should climb up.

"If I may respectfully suggest," said Nylund, "It seems quiet up there so far. Let your servants work for you. You can always step in if it becomes necessary."

Luvia wanted to protest, but after a moment she saw his point. She was exhausted physically and emotionally, and she didn't want to stray too far from Rin in any event. With her luck that night, who knew what last minute surprises the Durnovo might yet have lurking on the grounds?

"Very well," she conceded. "In the meantime…" she kicked aside the charred remains of a brick. "Please clean up this mess."

* * *

Rin woke up in a soft and warm bed, so comfortable that she had the fight the urge to roll around and go right back to sleep. She probably would have given in if the comfort hadn't been marred by a slight but persistent itch on both hands, centered on her palms.

She absently scratched them as she opened her eyes, slowly blinking. Instead of the plain white of her room back at the dormitories, she was faced with a coffered ceiling, the beams elegantly carved from hardwood. Rin sat up and took stock of her surroundings. She was in a western-style bedroom with old-fashioned furnishings in dark blue and rosewood. Even through the drapes, she could see the last orange sliver of sunset.

Evening, then. While a heavy sleeper, that was rather late in the day even for her. She leaned back against the headrest, trying to place things in her mind. She vaguely remembered dreaming of fire and darkness, but that alone didn't tell her much; nightmares had become only too frequent for her following the War. At least the itch in her hands seemed to be fading –

Hands, placed on each side of a monstrous skull. The image came suddenly to her mind, then a flood more of them, accompanied by memories of anger and fear and burning pain. The Durnovo manor. A twisting mass of unnatural flesh and appendages. Her own arrogance in locking wills with Gorynych's echo and its voice of flame. She forced herself to breathe. Wherever she was, she was still alive. But where was Luvia?

Rin was edging towards the side of the bed, fighting the lingering stiffness in her limbs, when the door opened. She sighed in relief when she recognized the familiar dark suit and serious expression of Aleksi. If Luvia's favoured bodyguard was present, then his mistress could not be far. Unless, her mind whispered treacherously, unless her desperate gamble had failed, and he no longer had a mistress to accompany -

"What the hell happened?" she said, glaring at the man as if the weight of her gaze could somehow force answers from him, "Is Luvia -?"

"Lady Luvia is fine," he said with a smile, taking a seat in a chair across from her. "Jacopo Vendramin and his son as well. "

A wave of relief crashed down on her, and on its other side she could breathe again. Then in its wake, the familiar prickling of anger. _That idiot. We'll see how fine she is after I'm done slapping her silly for what she put me through._

"There's a full mission debrief, but I'm not to discuss it with you for the time being," continued Aleksi. "Too much stress, you see," he said in response to Rin's disgruntled huff.

He followed her gaze as she looked around the room again, taking in a nearby table neatly stacked with medical supplies – white gauze, ointments, and other items. "We are in the Aaltonen house in Helsinki," he explained. "You were covered in second degree burns when recovered, and Lady Luvia wanted to minimize travel until you had recovered."

Rin looked down at her hands, dimly remembering the agonizing fire that had engulfed them, but they looked fine, the pale skin smooth and unblemished. Even the itch seemed to have faded away.

"Pain management for burns is notoriously difficult, and you are … well, known to be of a stubborn disposition. So it was decided to put you into an induced coma for a few days." Ignoring the indignant look on her face, he continued, "I've been assigned to keep watch over you while you mended. I am glad you seem to be doing well."

So Luvia had gone as far as to task her personal bodyguard to watch over her. Rin pushed down the warm feeling that threatened to suffuse her at the thought. This was all the blonde bimbo's fault, dammit. She was not about to start feeling grateful.

Aleksi opened his mouth to say something more, but she waved it away irritably. "Forget about that, where is she?"

"In her room, but …" he looked away and coughed lightly as Rin moved to slide out of bed, "… you may want to get dressed first."

She paused, and then briefly glanced down. In her haste to find Luvia, she was about to wander out in pyjamas. "Right," she said, fighting down her embarrassment, "I'll get myself ready then."

A shower and fresh clothes might have done wonders for Rin's appearance, but nothing much for her mood. She found Aleksi waiting for her in the hallway outside. A small smile played on his normally inscrutable face, but she could think about that later. Right now her ( _worry)_ ire was for someone else.

She followed him down the hallway, distantly noting the framed oil paintings and expensive-looking furnishings. Not so long ago, the wealth and prestige they represented would have stoked her envy; now they seemed meaningless in the face of the emotions flooding through the former school idol. Relief, first and foremost, followed closely by the ever-present anger, but also apprehension that something had yet gone horribly awry, pride that they had pulled themselves alive out of yet another impossible situation, and an almost indescribable longing to see those piercing brown eyes, that mischievous smirk, the eyebrows raised in mocking wit. And with that longing, fear that she had lost control, that her carefully maintained walls had cracked in a way that she might never be able to repair.

Which in turn made her angry all over again. Really, it was just as well that the hall was empty of staff. In her precarious mental state, she wasn't exactly upholding the image of the cool collected noblewoman.

When Aleksi pointed out the door at the end of the hallway, Rin nodded briefly at him. "Thank you. You're dismissed." She didn't need him here for this. After all, as Luvia's bodyguard, he would probably feel obliged to stop Rin from beating some much-needed sense into the blonde.

The man agreed readily enough, quietly excusing himself to disappear around the corner. His easy willingness to leave his charge might have been cause for concern, had Rin's thoughts not been otherwise occupied. As it was, she was entirely focused on the door in front of her. She could hear voices on the other side, if not the exact words. One was Emmi's, the maid's familiar tones a reassurance in this strange house. And the other – oh, Rin was going to have _words_ for that other.

She didn't stop to knock. She just opened the door and stormed in.

Luvia was sitting at a small table, considerably more adorned than the one back at the dormitories, with a cup of tea and a number of bright gemstones before her. Emmi hovered nearby with an ornate box, opened to show the red felt lining that protected the precious stones while they were in transit. Both stopped their conversation to look Rin as she stomped in. Emmi moved back nervously, but Luvia coolly got to her feet and damn her, she should be cowering under Rin's glare, begging her forgiveness, but nothing of the sort. Instead there was an equal storm on her brow, and a glower that declared she was one step from having Rin thrown into a dungeon.

"I'll excuse myself then." The maid nodded and backed away toward the door. Both magi ignored her in favour of glaring at each other, long moments as blazing blue-green locked with furious amber.

Rin cracked first. She lunged forward to grab Luvia by the front of her dress, only to have her hand caught at the wrist.

"You idiot!" she yelled, not even bothering to yank her hand back. "Lying to me! Sending me away like that! What on earth were you thinking?"

"I believe that is _my_ line! I gave you a simple order, why did you not follow it? Why must you always be so difficult?"

"Difficult, hah! Just admit you didn't think I could hack it." She fought to claw back the tremor that threatened to seep into her voice. "Did you really think that little of my skills? Or was it that you thought you couldn't trust me?"

"What?" Luvia looked honestly lost for a moment, before angry colour returned to her cheeks. "Don't be absurd. It had entirely to do with your volatile temper. Like that business with the skull! Do you have any idea how frightening that was to see?" Her grip on Rin's wrist softened, then let go in favour of taking hold of the black-haired girl's hand. "It looked like it was going to burn you to ashes, and there was nothing I can do about it." She squeezed Rin's hand even as she looked away.

Rin hesitated, then raised her other hand to brush lightly against Luvia's cheek, gently turned the blonde's head to face her. "If you understand that, then you should understand how I felt. When I realized that you sent me for a ride while you were risking your life." She swallowed hard, feeling the heat rising to her own face, but pressed on. "All I could think about was you getting hurt, you dying... it was horrible."

"I was ready for that," said Luvia. "It was my choice to risk my life, in the name of my ambitions. I didn't want the same for you, not after everything I already imposed on you. And not only do you defy me, you go up and beyond." The blonde gave her a fond smile. "Thank you for lending me your Blade. Unfortunately, it did not survive my use - "

"Who cares about the Blade?" Rin exploded. "It's replaceable. _You_ aren't replaceable, you... you..."

She tried to think of something suitably nasty, but found that all she could do was stare at Luvia's lips. She had often found herself doing so in the last little while, wondering how they would feel against hers, if they were as soft and pliant as they looked. And to think that Luvia had come so close to dying, that she herself had come to close to dying, and she would have entirely missed the chance to find out.

She was determined not to let the opportunity slip by again. Ignoring the screamed warnings from the rational side of her brain, she gently shook herself free from the blonde's grasp. Then she firmly placed a hand on each side of Luvia's face and drew her in for the kiss.

It was even better than Rin had dared imagine, lips soft and warm under her own. She took advantage of the other girl's surprise to deepen the kiss, invade her mouth with her tongue. Luvia tasted of the citrus tea she had just been drinking, and a faint hint of spice. And this must have turned into a fantasy somewhere along the way, Rin thought as she pressed forward, because she could feel Luvia's tongue beginning to tangle in hers, feel tentative hands begin to slide down her body.

Both reluctantly parted for air, flushed and breathing hard. Luvia looked dazed as she lifted a finger to touch her own lips in wonder. Rin seriously considered diving in for more, already hungry for more contact.

Then a knock at the door, sharp in the silence of the room. Both girls jolted as if they had been stung.

"Miss Luvia? Is everything alright?"

Of course, Emmi would have discreetly stayed outside the door in case her mistress needed her. It was natural that she would be concerned by the abrupt silence. Rin hastily composed herself, dropping her hands to smooth out her shirt and looking anywhere but at Luvia when the maid tentatively poked her head into the room.

"Ah! My apologies, I did not mean to disturb."

"That's okay, we were just about finished," said Rin as she turned to leave, hoping her face wasn't as red as it felt. She felt considerable regret that she wouldn't be able to further explore these delightful new sensations, but also some relief. She would have time to reconsider -

"We certainly are not," growled Luvia. Rin's head snapped around of its own volition to look at her. The blonde was staring at her so intently that she had to resist the urge to shrink back. "Emmi, please leave us for the next while. I do not wish to be disturbed for anything less than an emergency." Even as she spoke, her gaze never left Rin's.

"Very good, Miss Luvia."

The maid's footsteps echoed out, leaving Rin alone with the family head she'd so recently mauled. She felt like the hare pinned down by the wolf. What could she possibly say to explain herself? It didn't help that the blonde's taste still lingered on her lips, sending a tingling warmth flowing through her body. It made it damnably difficult to focus just when she most needed to.

She was saved from having to come up with something when Luvia rounded on her. "Did you mean it?"

Rin's brain seized up, leaving her first instinct to take over – when in doubt, deflect. "Of course you're irreplaceable. There's no one else quite like you, you're the most aggravating -"

"Don't be coy," interrupted the blonde, still holding her gaze. "The kiss. Did you mean it?"

Ah, she was being given the chance to back out. To pretend her entirely inappropriate advance on the family head had been a joke, or a poorly thought out attempt at petty revenge for the mission's stresses. All she had to do was apologize, and the incident would be duly swept under the rug. Very generous, in its way.

Too bad Rin was feeling mutinous. No, after everything they'd risked the other night, all the fear she'd felt over the blonde magus, she had no intention of backing down.

"Yes, I did," said Rin, "And I'd do it again in a heartbeat." She glared at Luvia, daring her to do her worst.

Luvia closed the distance between them, looking intently into Rin's eyes as if searching for something, before nodding in satisfaction. "Good," she said, and leaned forward to capture Rin's lips in a rough, hungry kiss that took her breath away.

Rin parted her lips instinctively, her mind shutting down as their tongues resumed their earlier dance. Strong arms were gently but firmly running down her body, around her waist to pull their bodies closer, breasts and hips separated only by thin layers of cloth. This was dizzying, this was intoxicating. She wanted more of it.

She felt herself being pushed backwards, but it was a vague sensation at best through the pleasant haze that had settled in her mind. Luvia nipped playfully at her bottom lip as she pulled away. Then suddenly she was pinning Rin against the wall, fingers deftly undoing the buttons on her shirt.

"Lu- Luvia!" Rin spluttered in surprise. The blonde was slipping Rin's shirt off her shoulders, pressing searing kisses against the exposed skin. "Luvia, wait!"

"Do you not want this?" Luvia looked at her seriously.

"O- of course I do," said Rin, mortified by the red she felt rising in her cheeks, "I just... are you sure?"

"I am," said the blonde, leaning forward to whisper in her ear, "And this has been building between us quite long enough."

Then she ran her hot tongue along the shell of Rin's ear, causing her to shudder, before trailing down her neck to nip at the bottom of her throat, where her pulse was now throbbing rapidly. Rin groaned as she tilted her head back, exposing her neck even more. Luvia was only too glad to take advantage, grazing her teeth against sensitive skin. Her hands slipped lower to grab the waistband of Rin's skirt, gently pushing it down so that she could explore the soft curves and lean muscles of the other magus' hips and ass.

The sensation was wonderful, but Rin couldn't help but wonder how much better it would feel with her own hands roaming the blonde's skin, those contours she'd ogled enough to feel as if she had memorized them. Fortunately Luvia seemed as eager as she was, whispering encouragements as Rin slid her hands under her dress, up along those perfect thighs. She pulled up the material, fumbled a bit with the straps and buttons she encountered, but with a bit of help from her partner the garment was soon off. Along with the blonde's undergarments, her dazed brain informed her.

Rin gaped at the sight of Luvia Edelfelt gloriously nude in front of her. Her flowing ringlets may have covered her nipples, but they did nothing to hide the gentle mound where those shapely legs met. It didn't help that Rin herself had already lost most of her clothes, with only stockings and black panties to cover her remaining modesty. She swallowed hard, feeling a throbbing warmth building in her own center.

Luvia reached for her again, and Rin was only too happy to arch into that touch. Soon they were a blur of hands and mouths on heated flesh. Fingers carded through hair, undoing ribbons, gladly twirling around the freed tresses. Somewhere along the line, Rin wasn't quite sure when and how, they had both fallen back on Luvia's bed. She was being pressed down on the mattress, the blonde smirking down at her, eyes bright with desire. She could lose herself in those eyes, rich brown with flecks of warm honey.

They shared another kiss, lips and tongue moving eagerly against each other. But when Luvia pulled back to look down at her again, she seemed surprisingly hesitant. As if now that she had Rin right where she wanted her, she wasn't entirely sure what to do next.

 _She's acting confident to put you at ease, but she's nervous too._ Rin felt absurdly touched. _I should help her_. She took a deep breath, then reached up to fold her arms around Luvia's neck, drawing her closer.

"Touch me," she whispered, wriggling her body invitingly despite her rising embarrassment. "Anywhere you like."

Then Luvia smiled at her. Not the practiced smile of the aristocrat but a real one, full of joy and affection. Rin couldn't look away, even as the blonde's hands roamed her body again, heat following every trace of her fingertips. She tensed however when Luvia's hand trailed along her collarbone to approach the swell of her right breast.

Luvia paused, resting her palms lightly above Rin's chest. "What's wrong?"

"Ha, nothing. Just ..." she muttered as she looked away. She was keenly aware that her chest did not measure up to the other magus' generous assets. _Why did Sakura get all the good genes?_

Luvia smiled again before placing a hand on each of Rin's breasts, making her gasp at the contact. That smile widened as hands kneaded gently kneaded the flesh together and apart, and Rin involuntarily gave a low moan of pleasure.

"You have nothing to apologize for. The body is a gestalt; every piece harmonizes into a complete whole, a work of art. These," said the blonde before giving Rin's breasts a playful squeeze that elicited a surprised yelp, "complement the masterpiece perfectly."

Rin felt her cheeks flush a brighter red than ever. "Whoever painted you clearly started with your boobs as the centrepiece," she grumbled.

Luvia laughed, then dropped down to capture a pink nipple between her lips, causing Rin to let out a small cry. A tongue ran across the small bud before twirling lightly around it, adding fuel to the desire burning in Rin's belly.

Smirking in satisfaction, the blonde pulled back to trail her hands lower, nimble fingers tracing patterns on shivering flesh. Then Luvia stopped, frowning at something. Rin crooked her neck up to see, following the other's gaze until it fell across the long, twisted scar that ran along her stomach. The sight took her back to that nightmare under the Ryudou temple, the end of her battle with her sister, and she shuddered. She hesitated to look up at the other girl, expecting her to recoil from the faded line and all it represented.

But instead of disgust or pity, Luvia looked at the scar in wonder before lightly tracing it with her finger. Rin breathed out in relief, then in turn lightly touched a faint but recent scar along Luvia's shoulder. They smiled knowingly at each other and kissed again, their tongues dueling feverishly.

Even as her lips remained pressed firmly against Rin's mouth, Luvia let her hands resume their quest down the length of her partner's body. They hooked the black silk of Rin's panties and slide them down, letting cool air hit the warm wetness of her aching core.

"Hey -" began Rin, but long nimble fingers were already playing with the soaked curls between her legs, brushing against sensitive flesh.

"This wet for me already," purred Luvia, before slipping a single finger between slick lips.

Rin's hips involuntarily jutted upwards at the contact. "Ahhh! Luvia, wait -!"

"You said anywhere I want, remember?" The blonde smirked before adding another finger, curling them experimentally inside tight inner walls. Then she began to pump her fingers, slowly at first, but with increasing fervor.

Any thoughts Rin had about further complaints were blown away by the sensation, hot spikes of pleasure lancing through her body. She had certainly pleasured herself in the past, but something about sharing this with someone else, with – she could admit it now – a lover, made the experience different. So much better.

She let out little cries as Luvia's talented fingers grazed against her inner walls and their sensitive nerve endings. Even worse when the blonde shifted her thumb to rub over the slippery nub at the apex of her folds. Rin gasped loudly and dug her nails into the other's shoulder as she arched back against the touch.

Luvia kissed her again, swallowing Rin's increasingly desperate moans, then pulled back to move her head down. Rin barely noticed at first, still caught up in the incredible sensations coursing through her body. Then she felt a kiss being pressed against her collarbone, before a sharp, stinging pain replaced it. She jolted with a small cry, then blinked down to see Luvia looking proudly at the bright red mark she had just bitten into Rin's skin, even as she continued pumping into her.

"Was... was that quite necessary?" Rin rasped out.

Luvia caught her gaze, her brown eyes ablaze with an intensity that made Rin shudder. "Yes, it was," she said firmly.

Then the blonde redoubled her efforts, circling her thumb around Rin's clit in a way that dragged pleading whimpers from the stubborn magus. That pressure in her core continued to build, stronger and hotter.

"Ahh, fuck! Luvia... please, I'm..." Rin panted, coherence beginning to slip away under the barrage of overwhelming sensation.

"It's alright. Come for me."

Rin let out a strangled scream as she careened over the edge. Her mind was shot through with fire, burning with sensation, making her lose control of herself. But it was nothing like Gorynych's searing flame. This was kissing the sun, drowning in heat and silence, before falling back to earth with eyes still blinded by light.

She took some time to recover, covered in a sheen of sweat and panting hard while little aftershocks coursed through her body. Luvia patiently waited, happily twirled black locks around her fingers. Even if Rin's eyes were still a bit unfocused from that incredible rush, she could still make out Luvia's triumphant smirk. The sight ignited a need to wipe that expression off, to give as good as she had just gotten.

Rin slowly sat up, giving her partner an innocent smile to entice her to join her. Understanding twinkled in Luvia's eyes, she wasn't fooled for a moment, but she readily raised herself to accept another tender kiss. Then Rin placed her hands on both of the blonde's shoulders, pushed her down onto the bed. Her partner let herself fall with a happy sigh that made Rin's heart leap, and almost made her lose her focus. Almost.

She pressed kisses along Luvia's toned stomach as she moved down, mapping out the flat plane and the gentle curves below as if they were something precious. A gentle nudge opened shivering thighs her. Beneath the patch of blonde hair, she could see that Luvia's entrance was already wet and glistering.

Trying to steady her own heartbeat, she carefully spread open the delicate pink folds and moved her finger experimentally inside. She was rewarded with a soft moan, and hands burying into her hair. A promising reaction, but Rin's competitive spirit wouldn't be satisfied with just that.

She drew her finger back out, eliciting the beginning of a protest, before settling her face between Luvia's thighs. She hesitated briefly, debating whether this really was such a good idea, before an impatient tug on her hair brought her back to the present. Rin flicked her tongue against slick folds, and heard a delighted groan above.

Encouraged, she began licking with more energy, feeling Luvia's hips rock against her mouth. The taste was tangy and a bit salty, but by no means unpleasant even as it coated her tongue and chin. Luvia's breathing was coming quicker now, accompanied by small gasps as fingernails dug into her scalp.

Remembering the sensation of the blonde's fingers against her clit, she moved her tongue upward along Luvia's centre before pressing against the small bundle of nerves nestled at the top. Luvia bucked hard as she cried out. Determined to press her advantage, Rin wrapped her lips around the trembling bud and sucked.

Within moments she felt the body around her tense, the rhythmic clenching of inner walls around her face. Luvia crested her peak with a sharp cry and a whole-body shudder before collapsing back in a contented daze.

Rin grinned, wiping her mouth and propping herself up so she could enjoy the view. Not to mention the mana now flowing through her magic circuits, not as much as if she'd been actively trying to establish a contract, but still there. Luvia's mana was warm and pleasant, like heat from a rock that's been baking in the sun on a perfect summer day. Warmer still when she sat up to wrap her arms around Rin, pulling her into a languid kiss.

They laid back together for some time, tangled in each others' arms, sweaty and tired but supremely satisfied. Rin could easily fall asleep, pressed up against Luvia's side, her face nuzzled in the crook of her neck.

But ever the practical magus, she couldn't quite ward off reality. "Where do we go from here?" she eventually asked, shifting upwards to look at her lover.

Luvia was silent for long moment, running her fingertips admiringly over the love bite she had left on Rin's collarbone. "I will work something out," she said eventually.

Rin reflected that if there was anyone who could drown a scandal, dance the intricate web of subterfuge and intimidation required, it was Luvia. Still, staying here much longer would make her family head's task considerably harder. It was pretty much impossible to hide their love-making from Emmi between their earlier performance and the musty smell of sex permeating the room. Or from Aleksi, she realized with a groan.

At least both were fiercely loyal to their mistress, and could probably be trusted to keep her secrets. She wasn't as sure about the rest of the staff at the Aaltonen house, who served the Edefelt head more distantly. And someone was bound to notice if Rin's bed was cold and empty in the morning. She had to leave now if she wanted to grant Luvia the tiniest shred of plausible deniability.

Reluctantly she began to disentangle herself from girl and sheets alike. But Luvia was either supremely confident in her ability to handle things, or the afterglow was making her reckless, because she hooked an arm around Rin's waist.

"Stay."

Neither a command nor a plea, but a heartfelt request. Rin felt an odd fluttering in her chest, fragile but somehow deeper than the release that had rocked her earlier. She moved back to snuggle into Luvia's embrace, laying her head along the other girl's shoulder.

"Just for you."

* * *

 **Author's note** : And the fic finally earns its M rating. *blows party horn* This chapter is dedicated to Mongol, who writes Rin/Luvia fic to die for and inspired this whole mess in the first place. Seriously, if you have not checked out their work over at AO3, you owe it to yourself to have a look.

 **DschingisKhan** : I feel bad for Clemence too, but horrible death is an occupational hazard of being an OC in fanfic. I tossed it back and forth for a bit, then decided a reprieve would need enough elaboration to take away from the main pairing. And it does seem in line with the Nasuverse theme of terrible things happening to anyone touched by magecraft. Why do we love these stories so much again?

 **Dessert Maniac** : Oh god, I named the familiar Gregor because it was insectoid, and I thought I was being clever naming it after a Russian story featuring a giant insect. I never even thought of the implication of _Metamorphosis_ concerning a human becoming a cockroach. You're quite right to point out the ambiguity, and now I am both creeped out and tickled pink. Can we pretend it was intentional?

As for Luvia's line of thought, it revolved around Rin's apparent ability to work the impossible when under high pressure, compounded by exhaustion, stress, and seeming lack of other options. Still, it did work out, if not exactly the way she would have liked it to.

 **Omaomae** : Thank you as always for the kind words! I figure if Nasu can make King Arthur a girl, Tamamo-no-Mae into a housewife aspirant, and Hassan into a hive mind, I can have some fun with corrupted mythology too. Gratuitous dragon skulls for all!

 **Linkjames24** : It did take a while to get there, didn't it? I know I said this before, but next fic I write, I swear I will put the smut in the very first chapter to get it out of the way.


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Some weeks later found Rin rapping at Lord El-Melloi II's door. She could hear the man's voice cursing as his footsteps approached. The door swung open and her professor glared at her, green eyes raging as if blaming her for something. She automatically opened her mouth to defend herself when her attention was grabbed by the music, a jaunty tune with military overtones, playing from a small object clasped in the man's hand. She craned her neck to see a screen displaying small pixelated characters, and realized she was looking at a handheld gaming device.

"Don't just stand there, come in," grumbled her professor, immediately returning his focus to the device as he stepped aside to let her in. He sat on a nearby couch, punching the buttons with a vehemence he usually reserved for particularly shoddy research papers. Rin took a seat in the chair across from him, wondering if she should be flattered that he felt comfortable enough to indulge in his hobbies in front of her, or insulted that he was once again keeping her waiting. Probably insulted.

A minute later, a tinny-sounding scream came from the device, followed by a few notes of downbeat music. El-Melloi II swore, dropping the device to one side. "Stuck again." He sighed and looked up. "This is almost certainly a waste of time, but I don't suppose you're familiar with Grausamen Hund Alliance 3?"

She gave him a flat look.

"Fuck! And you call yourself Japanese."

"I'm not even going to dignify that with a response," she said loftily. She rummaged in her bookbag and took out a notebook. She wrote out a list of names, then ripped the page out and handed it to her professor, who read them with a frown.

"The _Rauðskinna._ The _Liber Officiorum Spirituum_. _De Vermis Mysteriis_." His eyes swept down the rest of the list. "These are…"

"I got the most problematic ones out from the Clocktower's library. There's more in private collections, of course. I'll have to figure out what to do about those, but one step at a time."

"You intend to destroy them?"

Rin sighed. "That would be clean and easy, wouldn't it? Unfortunately, some of these texts have valuable information that isn't anywhere near sinister. Stuff it would be a real shame to lose. Burning the texts feels kind of like tossing the baby out with the bathwater. So I was thinking, you've got connections with people who aren't the old guard. Can you find a safe place to store them, far away from the Clocktower's political games?"

El-Melloi II furrowed his brow as he read over the titles again. He reached into his coat and produced a cigar, lighting it and taking a long drag as he considered. "I can, but there's obviously some risk." He blew out a wisp of smoke. "Does Miss Edelfelt know what you've been up to?"

Rin laughed. "Luvia bribed the librarian to look the other way."

She couldn't help but look a little smug as El-Melloi II looked at her in surprise, his mouth hanging open slightly. Then he took a puff as he fixed her with another frown.

"Something wrong?" she asked.

"Not really," he shrugged. "I was just marveling over what people will do to please their girlfriend."

Rin could still feel the heat in her cheeks as she left, but there was no point denying El-Melloi II's implication. Even if her reaction - a sudden blush accompanied by a coughing fit - hadn't given it away, the evidence of her growing closeness with the Edelfelt heir was there for anyone who cared to look.

Rin had assumed that after that first night, their, ah, liaison would be carried out with utmost discretion. In plainer words, she had expected to be Luvia's dirty little secret. But that didn't seem to correspond at all with the blonde's recent behaviour, the way she openly doted on Rin even in public. There were too many affectionate touches, impromptu kisses, excursions that it would be difficult to describe as anything but dates.

Not to mention the frequency of… well, more intimate activities. Her heartbeat picked up at memories of unleashed desires, searing kisses and intertwined bodies. She resisted the urge to run her hand along her throat and chest, where Luvia had scored her with plenty of love bites over the last month. Even now, Rin was wearing a high-collared shirt to hide the mark she had gotten just last night. Nor were they likely to stop being a part of their romps any time soon. Rin had accidentally left one in return, when she had clamped her mouth down a little too hard on Luvia's shoulder in a futile effort to muffle her own moans. Rather than upset at being marked in turn, Luvia had looked pleased; very pleased.

Fighting down the renewed flush that threatened to overwhelm her face, Rin walked down the stairs and opened the door on a bright summer day. Luvia was waiting for her on the bench, humming a tune to herself as she basked happily in the sun, the world's most extravagant cat. She looked utterly at peace despite the relative proximity of the erstwhile Waver Velvet. But then, she seemed to be growing more tolerant of him recently, although Rin doubted that the two would ever be friends.

Luvia smiled and rose from her seat when she saw Rin approach. "Shall we be off? It is a gorgeous day for a walk in the gardens."

Despite all the uncertainty in their futures, and the many questions she still had, Rin was content to take her hand and follow along. Warmth settled in her that had little to do with the afternoon sunshine.

* * *

 _ _–_ and although such inquiries are somewhat unusual, you are neither the first to seek it out, nor I daresay the last. Indeed, I imagine that the process would have more backing were it not for the tradition of son preference that still prevails among magi. Nevertheless, alchemical experimentation has been accomplishing much in combination with sounder understandings of the structure and operation of gametes, and I believe I can confidently say that – _

Luvia smiled as she placed the letter back on the small pile arranged in front of her. While she normally didn't care much for paperwork, she felt entirely differently about correspondence received in pursuit of one of her personal goals. While it was not strictly necessary that she find the answer she was looking for, it would help smooth the way forward for what she had in mind. Not to mention make her very happy indeed -

She heard a grunt from the other end of the table. She looked over to where Mikael was reading through her official stack of papers. He sorted through the missives in resignation, his mouth twisted into a sour grimace. If there was anyone who hated paperwork more than Luvia, it was her cousin. This made assigning such work to him an ideal punishment.

She had not really thought punishment was required. Rogday Durnovo had researched his enemy and carefully tailored his trap to Mikael's weak point. Such things happened in war, and no blame need be attached. But her cousin had wanted to be sanctioned, a means of atoning for the failure he perceived in himself. So she had given him what he wanted, and at the same time freed up time to devote to her own project. All in all, a most satisfactory resolution.

Mikael reached for the next document, an envelope bearing a familiar seal . "There's a letter here from old Jacopo."

"I believe that our accounts are settled," said Luvia, only half paying attention. She had better things to think about, things concerning a certain raven-haired temptress.

Distantly she heard him unfold the letter, shuffle paper as he read through. "No, it's not about the Durnovo job. This is a different request."

"Oh?" she said automatically, her mind still elsewhere.

"Well, I guess we shouldn't be surprised. Jacopo's out a fiancée for his son after all. And they do seem to work well together." He sighed. "Still, asking for Rin's hand for Marco - "

"Absolutely not!" snapped Luvia. _Mine! She's mine, I've marked her, you can't have her!_ She forced down that train of thought with some difficulty, then belatedly schooled her features into haughty contempt. "I went through great effort to recover that Crest. I will not see it go to another family."

"Jacopo's thought of that," noted Mikael as he turned the letter over. "He's willing to return the Crest to us, along with the first child that proves compatible with it." He whistled. "He must really want her, if he's ready to give up a potential heir like that."

"No," she said sharply. "Rin would never accept it."

The two cousins looked at each other. It didn't even need to be said that Luvia could simply order the other magus into the arrangement. She had sworn an oath of obedience, after all.

Luvia closed her eyes and grimaced as she pictured Rin's expression were she to give such a command. The look of shock and betrayal that would spread across that lovely face. Giving away her child to another family for the sake of magecraft would be an unbearably cruel echo of what had happened to her sister, what she still blamed herself for. Even if the Edelfelt clan was nothing like the Makiri – the blonde curled her lip in disgust at the notion – it would still shatter her. Rin would never forgive her, and Luvia would never forgive herself.

Eventually she heard Mikael sigh. "If it makes any difference, you'll need to start thinking about yourself as well. You're soon going to be under considerable pressure to find an eligible fiance." He answered her quirked eyebrow with a sardonic smile. "Recovering the skull gave you a lot of shine among the elders. Not everyone's happy about that, and some of them are looking for ways to take you down a peg. Since it's harder now for them to challenge you directly, they want to trap you under a husband's thumb."

"Ohohoho! How naive of them," said Luvia with a fierce smile. "As if I could not run rings around any puppet they would choose. Not that I have any intention of allowing them to dictate to me."

He grinned. "That's the family head I chose to support. Besides, it's pretty clear that you've already made your choice."

She thought about protesting, but sighed instead. "That obvious, is it? I suppose some things never change. She really does bring out the worst in me." She rested her chin on folded hands as she considered. "It would cause a lot of complications."

"Maybe, but not as many as you think. You underestimate just how much clout you've gained with your recent successes. For all that the elders talk about tradition and dignity, what they care most about is results."

"True. And as you said, I am an Edelfelt. I will take what I want." Her grin would have done credit to a shark. "Aunt Sanni will have only herself to blame. She is the one who wants me to take a consort, after all."

"Please let me know when you plan to deliver the happy news. I'll be sure to bring my camera."

"You almost sound as if you approve." She arched an eyebrow. "Are you not the one who said she would betray me?" The challenge in her words was somewhat undercut by her teasing lilt.

"Reason more to always keep her where you can see her." He looked pensive for a moment. "Although if you change your mind and decide you don't want her, I wouldn't mind having her. She packs quite the punch -"

"Are you trying to court my wrath, cousin?"

Mikael grinned, and she found herself grinning back.

"What about Jacopo's letter?" he asked eventually.

"While I have some reservations about Jacopo himself, Marco seems to have a good heart. He could use a strong woman to shore him up and take him in hand. Nor would it hurt to have a connection with inheritors of Imaginary Numbers." She clapped her hands as she came to a decision. "Ask among our cousins to see if anyone is interested in a matchmaking meeting with Marco. If they prove compatible, we shall make Jacopo a counterproposal."

"You could just designate a candidate," said Mikael, watching her intently.

"I could," agreed Luvia. "That would have been the old way. But a family, even a magus family, needs to adapt with the times. Maybe it is time we tried something different."

* * *

Summer turned to autumn, and with that the beginning of a new school term. Rin sat at her bedside, looking over a Finnish recipe book. Emmi had been only too happy to fulfill her request. She had even tabbed certain dishes to bring her attention to them. Doubtless they were Luvia's favouries.

Although the maid had always been friendly towards Rin, she had grown even warmer towards the magus of late. Ever since... well, ever since her present arrangement with Luvia. It was disconcerting. _I wonder if this is what it feels like to have your girlfriend's mother approve of you_ _?_

She could hear footsteps outside her door, the distinctive clack of said girlfriend's favourite shoes. There was a knock at the door, as befits politeness, but it was a fiction – they both knew Rin would never deny her entry. Still, Rin took the opportunity to hide the recipe book in her nighttable before calling for Luvia to come in.

"I do hope I am not interrupting anything?" Luvia smiled, that smile that always made Rin's heart do a little leap. To be fair, the blonde was achingly beautiful. And rather than fade with exposure, the time they spent together only magnified her charms in Rin's eyes.

She realized she had been staring, and hastily cleared her throat. "Nothing that can't wait. How was Turku?"

"Quite pleasant, thank you The Clocktower may be a place of learning, but despite my best efforts, its accommodations remain barely acceptable. Such a relief to finally enjoy some comforts! Not to mention the chance to catch up with some of our more amiable relatives." She gently nudged the other girl. "You should accompany me next time. Matters were ... complicated at your pledging ceremony. I believe you would all benefit from a second introduction."

Rin huffed. "I suppose, so long as I don't have to spend any more time with Frans. Really, fuck that guy."

"Perhaps we shall save that one for later, then."Luvia took a seat on the bed next to her. She reached for Rin's hand, humming thoughtfully as she lightly traced patterns on her palm. Rin closed her eyes and breathed, savouring the contact.

"There is one matter I must discuss with you," said the blonde after a moment. "The family elders suggested it is time that I consider an engagement. I agree."

Rin choked violently on air before turning to look at her. The hand resting over hers suddenly felt like ice. "Engaged?" she sputtered as she pulled away. "Aren't you a bit young for that?"

Luvia looked at her coolly. "No need to look surprised. You know perfectly well that unions are often arranged years in advance of the actual marriage. It is the most expedient way to secure promising partners."

Rin had known this day was coming, but it still hurt. A lot. It couldn't have hurt more if the blonde had torn Rin's beating heart from her chest and left it to bleed out on the floor.

It took a while, but eventually she managed to growl out a response. "Congratulations then." She couldn't bring herself to ask who the lucky guy was, lest she hunt him down and _Gandr_ him into a wall.

"Mmm." Luvia was maddeningly calm, like she wasn't the least bit upset that they would be separated. Rin felt the familiar anger well up inside her, pushing her to throttle the blonde even as her sorrow made her want to curl up and cry. But neither would get her what she wanted – no, _needed_ -

"It seems like a good time to arrange your marriage as well." The blonde's even voice interrupted Rin's derailing train of thought. "So that you may be fully settled into the family."

Rin's back arched up defensively. This time she couldn't hold herself back. "Well," she spat, "whoever it is you have in mind, they'd better be ready to tolerate an affair. Because I'm _not_ giving you up."

Even through the roil of her emotions, Rin didn't miss the faint blush that spread across the blonde's cheeks. But it soon disappeared as Luvia resumed a haughty air. "I did promise to match you with a suitable cousin. However, that is proving exceedingly difficult. Between your stubborn temperament, your lack of grace -"

Rin was pretty much ready to murder her now.

"- and your talent for destruction, you are clearly too much for the relations to handle. As I am the only one capable of dealing with you, I suppose this leaves me no choice. I must take you for my own."

Rin blinked in the face of Luvia's wicked smirk, as her words caught up with her. Her brain buzzed with irritation even as her heart swelled with joy.

"And I certainly won't tolerate any affairs, so remove that unsightly notion from your mind at once," added the blonde.

Rin barely resisted the urge to hurl something at her. "You call that a proposal?! How dare you? Just because you knew I'd say yes no matter what - "

"You accept then." Luvia's smirk gave way to a radiant smile, and Rin knew she had seen a vision of paradise. Still, she had her pride, even if it was melting away in the face of her elation.

"I've half a mind to tell you - " she began anyway, before Luvia sealed her lips with a kiss. It started slow and tender, but steadily became more heated as their tongues fenced against each other. Hands tangled eagerly in hair, traced familiar and much-loved curves, as they both tumbled backwards onto the bed.

There wasn't much talking after that.

* * *

"How much trouble are you going to be in?" asked Rin afterwards, as she ran her fingers through golden curls. They were still beautiful, despite their disarray and the sweat. They matched their owner, who was currently snuggled in against her side.

"I am the family head," said Luvia, "As compensation for all the duty and hardship associated with the position, I occasionally get to have things my way." She moved her head up a bit to nuzzle Rin's throat, making the other girl sigh in contentment. "Besides," she giggled, "I can always present it as the ultimate triumph of the Edelfelts over the Tohsakas. Stealing away their last successor."

"Thank you for that," grumbled Rin. The blonde laughed and leaned over to kiss her. Rin bit Luvia's lip, vengeance for the quip, but then relented and returned the kiss. Eventually they pulled away to catch their breaths, smiling lazily and lovingly at each other.

It all still felt like a dream to Rin, the most wonderful dream she had ever had. After years of feeling cold and lonely in her self-imposed shell, she felt safe and warm. Held by someone who understood her, who had seen her real self and still had not turned away. Who had promised to stay by her side.

She closed her eyes, trying to picture a future together, and liking what she saw. There was one thought that made her a bit uneasy, though. "You'll still need to arrange for a heir," she murmured.

"Indeed," said Luvia. "It would not do to risk the headship falling to one of our less pleasant relations."

Rin hesitated, but the topic had to be broached sooner or later. "So... did you have a guy in mind? To be the donor, I mean."

Adoption was not generally a favoured option for magi, due to the need for genetic compatibility with a family's Magic Crest. It could be developed, of course, but it was a painful and risky process. One she wanted to avoid at all costs. She was still haunted by the violet hue forced into her sister's hair and eyes by the Matou.

"That is an option. And if it ends up being the one we choose, we will need to discuss it together. However, as we are fortunate enough to be magi, there may be other possibilities."

Rin's brain came up blank. It must have shown on her face, because Luvia sighed at her obtuseness.

"There are alchemical methods that will likely allow us to combine our eggs; have children together. Only daughters, due to our chromosomes, but I believe you would not object?"

Rin was adrift on a sea of emotions, roiling currents of joy, hope, fear, and more than a touch of embarrassment. A thought drifted on the surface, and she grabbed at it like a drowning woman. "You... you want me to carry your child?"

"Of course not. That would open too many opportunities for the family naysayers to cast shade on the parentage. I will be the one carrying, to leave no doubt that the child is the Edelfelt heir by blood." Her smile turned sly. "I suppose that will make you the father."

"That's not funny!" said Rin, as Luvia broke out in giggles. "Tch. Of all the things I could have in common with Saber..."

Then she smiled impishly. "If I'm the father, then you're taking my last name."

This time it was Luvia's turn to choke. "Certainly not. I just now stressed the need for clear legitimacy."

"A relationship is a give and take, princess. What am I getting out of this?"

"You have my love. What more do you need?"

Rin's blush matched the ripest of tomatoes.

"I... I love you too. I mean, I did agree to marry your high-maintenance ass."

"So can't you do this small thing for me?" asked Luvia, a mischievous look in her eyes as she traced a finger along the most sensitive spots on Rin's breast.

"Hold on! I'm not Emiya, you can't just bulldoze over me - "

Luvia turned her most fetching look on her.

"But - "

A wicked smile, a promise that the blonde would make it worth her while. Again and again.

"I'll think about it," said Rin grudgingly.

"Take your time," laughed Luvia. "The wedding will not be held for some years, after all."

"I must be crazy. Because I can't help but wish it was sooner."

"I as well," Luvia sighed happily.


	13. Epilogue

Epilogue

It was a grey morning in London, heavy clouds with just a scattering of light patches to promise that the sun would eventually return. Zelretch softly hummed to himself as he walked through the Clocktower's courtyard, enjoying the cool air and the crisp sound of leaves under his feet. A shame that students and instructors alike were giving him a wide berth. The looks of shocked horror had long since ceased to entertain and now merely bored him, and he was in the mood for a bit of conversation.

Ah, things were looking up. He smiled at the sight of familiar red and blue as his two apprentices came his way. Each was diverting enough on her own, and even better when encountered together.

Although still clumsy children, both had made far more progress in their magecraft over the last few years than he had expected. It pleased him to know that there could still be ambition divorced from malice, even among the magi of the Clocktower. And their growth had come from working together, rather than the bitter rivalry that defined their relationship in other worlds. Iron might sharpen iron, but it was equally true that one hand was needed to wash the other. Their two desks had long since been pushed up against each other in their mutual workshop, then later replaced with a single table to facilitate their joint projects. He was looking forward to seeing what they might accomplish, although of course he would never tell them as much.

"Master Zelretch," said Luvia, "It is good to see you out and about."

"Now Luvia, I've said it before. Just Zel is fine." He grinned when she couldn't quite suppress a wince, as his request crashed against her years of rigorous training in etiquette. He was doing her a favour by forcing her out of comfortable patterns, and if he took some enjoyment from the process, well, he could consider that his fee.

She cleared her throat and tried again. "Zel. We both wish to thank you for your tutelage –"

"Even when it bordered on outright sadism," grumbled Rin, which only made the vampire grin a little wider.

" _Ahem_. We owe you much, and we would be honoured if you would be in attendance for the next milestone in our lives."

She presented him with a decorated envelope, gold on cream paper. Zelretch already had a pretty idea of what it contained, but decided to play along. "For me?" he asked as he took the envelope and carefully tore it open. Sure enough, it contained a wedding invitation.

"I'm flattered," he said, and thought he might even mean it. He smiled at them. "I believe that my presence may upset some of your other guests."

"That is a bonus, yes."

"Rin," chided Luvia, although she couldn't quite keep a fond smile off her lips.

"You think so too, don't try to deny it," said Rin as she tossed a lock of hair back over her shoulder. "And it's not like he's going to be the only controversial guest there."

"My father," said Luvia, nodding her head in agreement. Her expression was as placid as ever, but the vampire could see both anticipation and an undercurrent of unease in her eyes. "And your Japanese relations, of course."

"I think it will make for a memorable evening," said Rin smugly.

Zelretch made a show of looking over the invitation, then smiled sweetly at them. "I understand that wedding invitations usually include a 'plus one'?"

They both looked gobsmacked, even ever-elegant Luvia. After a moment Rin managed to choke out, "... _you_ have a date?"

"Not quite the way you're thinking," said the vampire pleasantly. "However, I would like to bring along one of my other apprentices. One that I don't think has _quite_ absorbed just how many possibilities are reflected within the Kaleidoscope."

The two young women looked at each other, then shrugged.

"With all the weird people we already know," said Rin, "how bad could it be?"

Zelretch grinned to himself. Even after all he had seen over the last few centuries, he was definitely looking forward to this. A memorable evening indeed.

* * *

 **Author's note:** Finally complete! And it only took the better part of a year, haha.

A big thank you to everyone who commented or offered me feedback through PMs. You have no idea how encouraging all your comments and suggestions were, and how they gave me that extra kick in the pants to buckle down and actually post the next chapter. Thank you as well to everyone who followed along as House of Gold as it meandered towards its conclusion. Hopefully you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I'll probably get around to writing some more Fate-related F/F fluff at some point, but for now I think I'll go rest in my gutter for a bit.

Comments? Questions? Well-chosen stinging insults? Feel free to drop me a line.

\- TungstenCat


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